Scientific Name:
MusaProduct Details:
Corms: Corms look like bulbs on the outside and often have the same protective sort of covering. They also have a central growing point where the pseudostem and/or flower will emerge and a basal plate just like that of the bulb. Bananas, Crocus, gladiolus, and freesias all grow from corms. Corms will not show layers like a true bulb does if you cut them. The corm is actually a base for the pseudostem and/or flower stem packed with nutrients and quite solid in texture. As the pseudostem and/or flower starts to grow, the corm shrivels as its nutrients are used up. The corm creates new corms either on top of or next to the desiccated ones. The corms of bananas will die once the plant blooms and produces bananas and new corms will form attached to the old corm, these new corms produce new banana plants called suckers. Because it can take 9 to 15 months for some bananas to bloom and produce fruit it is possible for the original corm to live more than one year. This is not the case with corms that produce flowers every year; they will die once they have produced flowers. Most of your ornamental bananas will produce flowers every year. The bananas that generally bloom every year would be Musa ornata varieties. The Rojo banana is a variety that does not bloom or make bananas, and is generally used for its beautiful colors in the landscape as an ornamental banana.
Musa 1780 Corm- The 1780 is almost certainly a Cavendish with very tasty, edible fruit. The importance of this plant is that its origin can be traced back to the Caribbean island of Hispaniola in 1780 from which it was shipped to Laura Plantation (40 miles up the Mississippi River above New Orleans, Louisiana) where it has grown continuously in a mat since 1780, hence the name. The Spanish almost certainly collected its progenitors in Southeast Asia and brought them to Spanish lands (possibly the Canary Islands) and from there to Hispaniola. There are probably not too many mats of bananas whose provenance can be traced back more than 230 years. Grows 9 to 12 feet tall. Full sun.