Meanwhile in gardenin... I don't know yet if anyone gets the movie reference or not.  Street cat showed up. 🐈‍⬛😎🌴🤙

https://youtube.com/shorts/6HIB_vVHECM?is=nlWgDLPG3-MXBB8f

Told my daughter he oughta get some dingle balls like Cheech y Chong.  🤣

Yeah man. Sick ride! Is Dad from California? That doesn't seem like an ATL style. Sick tho. 

IBC, what kind of banana plants do you have? Do you know? The base of your plant looks different than mine. The base of your's has the tiers of layers on the trunk that make it look like a palm tree. The bottom of my plants never look like that. The shoots come all the way up and bend over, but they go all the way down and underground. They don't sprout up in levels like that. Also, my bananas are like "minis". The buddy that gave them to me told me what kind it was back in the day. Small bananas that are very sweet. Anyway, mine look considerably different. 

So, based on some quick research. I think I am growing Namwah bananas. The trees get 8-10 feet, and the bananas are small and sweet. The typical grocery store bananas are "cavendish bananas". They are the long, yellow guys with the typical banana flavor....

Now, there is also a chance that I am growing "Lady Fingers" or "Baby Bananas" which are a custom, dwarf version of the Cavendish plant. But the bananas are small and sweet, and look almost identical to the Namwahs....

Matter of fact, the guy that gave me the plants is somewhere on property today. I saw him this morning. I will ask him and clarify.

That said, every banana plant I have pulled up photos for has the smooth, full trunk like mine. Not the tiered levels of leave generation that look like the bottom of a palm...

Maybe I interpreted your post wrong, and the trunk of that plant was not the banana. If it was the banana, I am at a loss. Maybe you are growing bananas from Mars?

Anyway, here is a photo (not mine) of a Namwah, and based on the fruit traits and the look of this plant, I believe this is what I have. 

Dad is from Atlanta.  I'm waitin for more car info.  I got the mini bananas.  Only ones that can survive this far north, I bleeve.  Burro bananas, apple bananas, I've heard different names.  Here's a pic.  That other pic is one of the giant "tree crinum" lilies.  Reminds me of FEED me SeyMOUR!  Little Shop Of Horrors movie with Rick Moranis.  He might be the best geeky actor of all.  Maybe Jerry Lewis beats him.  Ok.  Second. 

Yours are older and taller.  Might be same as mine.  I definitely ain't a banana scientist.  These barely make fruit.  Only about 10%, 20% of it's capability.  Most of the little babies are yellow and just fall off.  Only the first ones make it to eatin size.

As I await more car info, here's one more.  I remember the round tail lights.  My 68 had em. The 70 had rectangle ones.  Think it was first year of no more circles.  Think she told me it's a 66.

Yeah, it sounds like we have the same plants. That makes sense that I was looking at a picture of a completely different plant. That is why I thought you were growing "Outer Space Bananas" haha. 

And as far as the fruiting goes, I think the main thing is: WATER!!!!! Texas and SC don't really have the natural percipitation and moisture that allows bananas to thrive. 

As I said before, the ONLY successful banana plant that I have fruited, was big momma #1 that I put over by the side of my yard, right on the edge of my grass and the woods. The positioning happened to be in the middle of a swale. So my yard slopes down slightly, hits the deep point, then a slight incline into the woods. Total elevation change is maybe a foot. But anyway, any rain and irrigation water collects in the exact spot where the banana tree was sitting. It got every drop of water that accumulated back there. I have probably 8 other plants in various locations throughout my side and back yards. And while a couple of them, in prime sunlight locations have produced bananas, the only one that made any good ones, and dropped mega babies undeneath was big momma #1. And I chalk that up to the fact that I planted it in what becomes a bowl of water every now and again....

Water. Water and more water. At least that is my assumption...

So, some random banana related info that I have come across. I had a buddy go to ecudaor a while back. When he returned, he said the strangest part of his trip was in the capital city, where there were so many banana trees, that the city streets would be lined with them and they bring out street sweepers and shit to clear the roads...

That sounded crazy to me... So, Ecuador is the Banana capital of the world, so I guess that makes sense. But i looked into it WAY back in the day, and it said that when the international trade routes are messed up, or production/sales prices for bananas falls out of favor with farming costs, that local farmers in Ecuador will dump truck loads of fresh bananas onto road ways, blocking traffic in "silent protest" to what is their major export industry.

Also, Costa Rica has a shit load of bananas. Maybe you boys can speak on this. But I guess they are saying that in San Juan and some of the major cities, they have Banana plantations up on mountains and hill. They use a cable system to attach banana bundles to, then they lower them down the cables down the mountain, crossing through the city and then down into an export warehouse area.... So they say in Costa Rican cities, there are signs and that it is common place that traffic will completely stop and allow the bananas to cross through intersections because they hand pretty low. In Costa Rica, these are called "Banana Breaks"...

Who knew? Bananas are fucking cool. 

This is unrelated and stuff, but about fruit, so I will share. So, I don't ever think about Apples, unless I am at an apple orchard up in the NC mountains or what not....

But a few weeks ago, I read an article, that back in the 1970s and 1980s, the only real apple available in the US and worldwide at the time was the "Red Delicious".... This went on for a few decades... I guess in the 1980s, some US farmers and scientists developed the "Granny Smith" apple, that is obviously green, but has a thinner skin and a more tart flavor. This apple swept the globe, gaining about 50% of the apple market.... People were just tired of the same ol' apples...

Then in the 1990s, some dudes up in Minnesota worked on a new "hybrid apple". They wanted a sweet, but acidic, tart flavor, kinda blending the granny smith and the red declicius apple, but they wanted a thinner skin so that the "bite" and "taste" was more palatable. So, after about 5 years, they did it. They created the perfect apple with the perfect bite and the perfect skin. They called it the "HoneyCrisp" apple....

Now, we all know that 95% of apples come from the state of Washington in the US. It's where all the major orchards are. So the problem with the honeycrisp was that it flourished in cold, mid-west climates, basically lower Canadian climates... While washington has cooler weather than CA, with a lot of clouds, it's also super wet and rainy, and when the sun is out a lot of the year, it's far more intense than you would find in Minnesota, so there were issues with soil, temp, climate and also, the sun would batter the apple skins and damage some of the crop.... So, the apple has "no shelf life" but it is said that often times, it takes 4-6 months for an apple to hit a grocery store, so that is a LONG time to keep apples fresh....

About 10 years later, they finally modified the plants so that they flourished in Washington State. 

In modern times, even at the grocery store, I see 8-10 apple varieties to choose from every day. So just in the past 20 years, the apple market has exploded because of science and demand and what not...

So it is interesting HOW much difference there is in raising apples in Minnesota, as compared to 1,000 miles away on a similar latitudinaly similar coordinates. 

So, that ties us back to Bananas. I think there are so many bananas in central and south America, that there is no market demand for it in the US. So to that point, any banana fans like us are going to have to deal with strains and species from natural locations and do our best to keep them alive....

Think about it like you would if you are a "smoker".... When I was in CA, you would walk by a dispensory and see a sign for what they offereed. there were like 25 varieties. All different. All custom...

I mean, growing up, I heard of "Kush" before, but even back in the day, you would see Kush, but it was broken down to:

Bubba Kush (The original, award winning strain from back in the day. One best in the world that year)

Purple Kush

OG Kush

Grand-Daddy Kush

Candy Kush

And so on... It's easier to have some weed plants "fuck" and make new strains.... But what I "learned" from that, from friends of course who took part in that =), was that no matter the modifications, and how nice something looked or smelled, it NEVER held a candle to the original. The Bubba....

So in CA, they encourage you to grow your own shit and what not, so in every store, you can buy clones and plants and all of that.... You stay away from people that have "OG Kush" plants and shit... Now, if you run into a guy that has REAL, Bubba clones, you fucking get them..... It's the best plant that has come out of the US, ever. And even with today's modifications and excelleration of science, I would ask anyone to show me something that will side-line you with way the ol' Bubba Kush does.... And if you are into this stuff, don't get confused by the word "purple"... Yes, Purple Kush has more purple in it. But when Bubba ush gets about 3/4 of the way through the growing stages, that shit starts to turn purple and gets so dusty it looks like it's covered in Cocaine....

So, supply and demand. Unless a black market for Hybrid bananas comes along, or Bananas start giving people buzzes, I think we are stuck with what Edcuador is sending us. 

Serena just verbal committed to Venus' college.  First person of this season for the college according to my daughter.  She's still gotta finish 1½yrs of HS first.  I'm kinda in disbelief over 2 granddaughters will be at the same college.  😲

TGIF, y'all.  Gettin close... 🌴😎🤙

Opened overnight.  😎🌴🤙

Meanwhile, in gardening... 😎🌴

https://youtube.com/shorts/sID74Cp2hAw?is=HKd6laF_vn-Sh23h

IBC, so, it's been over a month since my son and I started trying to germinate that Avocado seed. Last weekend, I was sitting about back with my wife and she looked at it and said "It looks like your avocado project is a fail. That thing looks dead"... I replied: Yeah, it's been longer than 3 weeks, so I think you are right. Maybe it was a bad one or maybe we didn't do it correctly. So, anyway, I still left it out there and didn't think anything of it....

So, Ravens Cowboys in Brazil yesterday afternoon. We usually do Sunday dinners with the In Laws. They come over to my crib because it's a later game. Anyway, we are all sitting out back watching the game and I look over and see the avocado seed. It's basically cracked in hald now. Not looking good. So, I grab it by the tooth picks on the side and lift it out of the water... And what do I see? A mother fucking root sprouting!!!!

Success! Kind of..... 

So, there is still hope. I am going to give it a couple more weeks in the water like this is says before I transfer to soil.... But anyway, I thought she was a goner, but she is still kickin'

There we go.  The friend handled the avacado to where you're at now.  I don't really remember the length of time.  You definitely got a baby growin.  😎🌴🤙

I think we waited a hair longer to see the root and a leaf pop out, but it could go in a little pot of dirt now.  Keep the dirt nice and wet, so it's almost like still in that water. 

Took this pic just now.  He's got side branches up over the wood fence now.   5yrs old.  He mighta been bigger if I hadn't postponed puttin him in the actual ground.  I DO recommend he stays in a pot til he's an actual baby tree.  Maybe 3ft tall?  So you can bring him indoors if it freezes.  

Anywho... Good luck! 😎🌴🤙🥑

Oh... the leaves always wilt at peak nuking sun.  Bananas same deal.  They all spread out and party at sunset.  No worries.  

I know it's way down the road, but... when he DOES go in the ground, that's it.  I'm told they can get 20, 30ft tall.  There used to be a ginormous tree right next to where I planted him.  Was directly on the property line.  They took it out when that wood fence went up.  I basically moved 2 ft in away from the fence and put him there.  There's still a stump like a foot wide under the fence next to him.  The old tree was around 20ft tall and at least that wide.  It covered that whole side of the yard where the garden is now.

People often ask me and Yoda after we landscape their yards how come there's so much room between the plants.  It's so empty lookin.  🤣   It's like April.  Come back in August and people are trimmin back plants that are on top of each other.   They grow, y'all.  At least, hopefully they do. 😎🌴🤞🙏

Yeah man. Excited about the avocado plant. Now that I know it works, I will probably start germinating a few more. We go through probably 4-6 avocados per week as a family. 

I will give it some time and definitely keep it in a pot throughout the winter. If all is well in the spring, based on how big it is, I will transfer it to soil. But I will keep it in a pot as long as I can to keep it nice and wet and healthy....

It's been a while, but back in my early CA days, I was pretty well versed in starting plants in water and then transferring them to soil =)