Before you get no answer at all ...
Banana pups are the banana's means of propagation. Banana stalks die after
bearing fruit, and the new offshoots are what will grow afterwards.
You can leave them or cut them off, you can replant what you cut off if
you
get enough rootball with it. If you let them grow for a long time they
will outgrow the planter, or at least get too heavy to move around -
I know, I moved most of what grew in 10 years in our back yard last year,
after it had been dug up with a backhoe because it grew into the
neighbor's
fence - I gave most of it away, replanted 2 clumps further away from the
fence, and a 70 ft long row on our Hawaiian Acres land for windbreak
(bananas
don't make good windbreak because they don't like wind themselves), and 3
more
clumps there. These banana root clumps can easily still weigh 50lb after
being
chopped into vaguely manageable chunks.
If you have room for more planters or people to give or sell them to, I'd
chop
them off - otherwise your planters will at some point become unmovable.
However, larger plants in larger planters are less susceptible to frost
and
easier to protect - and you may get bananas more often.
It depends on your exact situtation.
Maren, in Hilo, waiting for the new apple bananas to get ripe.
BTW: botanically they aren't trees.
Brian Bigler wrote:
> Hello,
> I live in a suburb north of Seattle, and this year I planted three hardy
> banana trees in a container that's now on my deck. The plants do really
> well in this climate, and will survive in winter down to 10 degree F.
They
> freeze to the ground, but come back each year. They won't bear fruit
except
> in very warm, long, summers. Well, this is my first experience with
this
> species, and there are about a dozen shoots popping up from around the
base
> of each plant. These, I think, are called pups, and I'd like to know if
> it's best to cut these off or just leave them alone. Also, what causes
> these shoots to form? I'd imagine it's in response to confinment within
a
> relatively small container (rather than being in the ground), but I
can't be
> certain.
>
> Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
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