Go bananas (I have!)
Here it may not produce much fruit, but the banana tree’s glorious foliage more than makes up for it, says Monty Don – and the sap is said to be a hangover cure
THERE’S no denying it, I’ve just gone a bit more bananas. That, you might think, is an entirely predictable thing but I am not referring to any specific behaviour or my mental health. Instead I have – gleefully – added another four large banana plants to my garden to complement the two Ensete ventricosum ‘Maurelii’ that I have been growing for the past few years.
These two Abyssinian bananas are tender giants with glorious plum-coloured leaves that can each become about a metre long and hang from growth that will reach 4.5 metres in one summer. But they will not tolerate the slightest cold weather. So every October I take a saw and cut them down to a stump, dig them up and store them over winter in a cool but frost-free dark shed so they are protected but grow as little as possible. They then have to be slowly allowed to regrow and gradually acclimatise to the weather before being planted back out at the end of May when the risk of frost has passed.
I plant these out into the borders but my four new bananas are being grown permanently in pots. It doesn’t matter what type of banana you choose, if it is to be grown in a container then the pot must be as big as possible. These are all hungry plants with greedy roots and large leaves that will grow substantially every year. As with my tender ensetes, they can be cut back hard every autumn so they start again the following spring but they are large plants and need plenty of richness in the form of garden compost or well-rotted manure added to the potting mix. On top of that they need watering daily in hot weather and at the very least a generous soak weekly.
I was prompted to acquire more bananas by a trip to Chatsworth House in Derbyshire where they proudly raise the dwarf Cavendish banana. Originally cultivated by the great Sir Joseph Paxton in the 1830s when he was head gardener to the Duke of Devonshire, two cases of plants were shipped in the 1840s to Samoa and while only one survived the journey, it went on to become the variety of choice for banana growers across the globe.
However a new disease is threatening the Cavendish banana, and as it is the source of all our fruit then potentially we could see the almost complete demise of bananas until a new commercial variety is established.
Gardeners over here are hardly likely to stem this problem, as it’s extremely unlikely for the plants to fruit outside of a hothouse here. But we can grow a range that will add richness to the foliage in our gardens.
The Japanese banana, Musa basjoo, is the hardiest and easiest to grow and will survive British winters in the south if it can be wrapped against the coldest weather. We grew a couple at Berryfields near Birmingham when we used to film Gardeners’ World there and they survived with straw and fleece padded around them.
I’ve also planted Musella lasiocarpa or the Chinese yellow banana, which has greeny-grey foliage reaching up to about 2 metres but these are graced with spectacular yellow flowers that look something like a golden artichoke.
Well, I confess I’m taking this on good authority because I’ve never seen one in flower and bought mine in hope and expectation rather than experience. But when it does flower,
I assure you that you’ll be the first to know. I’ll probably refrain from doing what the Chinese have apparently enjoyed through the ages, namely eating the plant as a vegetable – although it might be worth bearing in mind the apparent usefulness of the sap as a hangover cure.