Wow temperatures have really plummeted this week. Take last night for example, we
had temperatures of minus 1 degrees Celsius or 30 degrees Fahrenheit.
Now, our bananas have done fantastic this summer but it's now time that we need to
think about winterizing our bananas. Now there's loads of different methods for
overwintering bananas, but in this episode we are going to look at a few of
those and what I am going to do to try and overwinter my banana. And that's all
coming up after this. I'm Tony O'Neill and this is UK Here We Grow. On this channel we
deal with all things gardening, poultry keeping and beekeeping. If it's your
first time here consider hitting that subscribe button and Bell icon to be
notified each time we put up new content just like this. There are many cultivars
of banana and they all have different growing conditions, some are more hardy
like the Musa Basjoo and then others like this Dwarf Cavendish behind me are
not so hardy. Now, I set myself a massive challenge this year, and I wanted to see
whether I could grow an edible fruit on a banana in the UK without any extra
heat. That, is destined to fail. However, we now need to see if we can winterize
this banana because if we can get it through we are in with a chance.
Most of the UK falls into three growing zones which is 7 8 and 9. Now, it's
really important to select the right plant for your growing conditions and
bananas here because we are in zone 8 mostly, around this area, then bananas
don't do well because that means that we have really cold
minus temperatures and frost for long periods at a time. So, with that in mind
selecting the right plant is really important. Now the very hardy Musa Basjoo
would do really well in this climate, because it can get down to minus ten and
it's rare that we go below that for long periods at a time. The hardy Musa Basjoo
is the most cold tolerant banana plant there is. This plant can get down to
minus ten degrees Fahrenheit as long as it's properly mulched. It can also be grown
in all 50 states of the USA and the UK. However, this plant is an ornamental
plant and it although will give you the tropical feel in a garden, it will not
produce edible fruits. This plant can also grow up to five meters tall which
would take it around ten years. So although there are banana plants out
there that can deal with cold climates and the previous is ideal for tropical
gardens and things like that in the UK. If we want edible fruits, then we have to
pick a different cultivar. And I chose the Dwarf Cavendish for this, and a
couple of reasons for that. The first is because the weather in the
UK here we get very mild and short summers, and with that in mind I needed a
plant that had the potential to fruit relatively quickly. But also because we
have really cold winters I needed a plant I could grow inside, to
protect it from the worst of the weather. So these plants are quite fussy when it
comes to their care, and although the leaves are large and grow relatively
quickly, they are very weak and susceptible to frost damage. As you can
see we had a frost last night and it's gone. All the leaves are dead,
including a brand new when that's coming through up here.
I wouldn't even suggest trying to keep this in a cold room, through the winter
because you will find that you will wake up one morning to a mushy mess. But
against all odds I'm going to try and get this through
in a polytunnel, through the winter. And I'm going to show you how I'm going to
attempt that. Now I am pretty much writing the fate off to this plant based
on some ideas and I'm hoping that I can prevent frost from getting to it. I'm
hoping that we can keep this stalk but I can't see it happening. Everything inside
me is screaming dig it up and take it home. But when I set out to get this
plant growing I said that I wanted to see if it's possible to keep it in a poly
tunnel all year round. And that's what we're gonna do. Now I have taken some
small cuttings that were also frost damaged and we took some earlier in the
year as backups and they will be taken home so that we will still have a plan
to replace this one if it does go completely. I'm going to do some extreme
measures here today and try and prevent that from happening though. The first thing I'm
doing here is raising the base. The plant was originally planted on a mound of
soil and I found this year that had to dig out the edges of the soil to stop
the water from overflowing during watering.
By raising the sides I can add a layer of organic matter, this will stop the
overflowing and will also add additional insulation to the basal plate and roots.
We can now backfill this section being careful not to take the soil level too
high to prevent rotting off. Next we can cut the leaves of the plant and use
these as a mulch on the ground around the base of the plant.
And if you haven't seen how much it has grown over the last few months I will
add a link in the cards and description.
It's such a shame as this plant was looking awesome a few days ago. This will
leave us with just a stem, I would really like to get this through the winter if
possible as it will really give the plant a great start next season. I'm
going to wrap the stem with fleece to start, this will not be tightly wrapped
but will have quite a few layers.
Next a frame is built so that we can wrap the plant in bubble wrap.
And as I wrap the frame I fill it with straw in order to create an insulation
layer. Keep doing this right to the top and seal it off with a cap.
So here we have it folks, the banana is now insulated. Think of it as you going
out in the cold. The more layers of clothes you have on the more warm air is
trapped in between each layer and the warmer you are, and that's exactly the
same thing I've done here. We had that layer of fleece around the actual stalk
itself, then we've got a real big thick layer of hay and straw. And then around
that we have a nice big layer of bubble wrap. Now, the only thing I need to do is
put a topping over the top of bubble wrap and all I'm going to do for that is
just fold up some bubble wrap and stick it on top of all this straw. Hopefully,
that will produce enough warmth within there to protect the stalk itself, but if
it doesn't this should be more than enough insulation to protect the basal
plate and and root system and maybe it can throw a new one next year if it does
rot. So there's just a couple of other things that we might want to consider
here. And the first of those is watering through winter. We don't want to be
watering this through winter. Now that those leaves are died off this plant is
going to go dormant, and if we water that's going to be sat around those root
system and that plant is not going to take it up, and it's going to cause the
root system to rot off. So we're gonna leave it completely dry through the
winter and we'll start watering it again early spring. And another thing that we
may want to consider as well is that we'll want to shade this over if we have
a warm winter's day. Because that's an in a polytunnel is amplified through
all of these plastics and it could heat this area up and if it does that then it
might spurt that plant into growing again, which we want to avoid we want to
keep it dormant. Question of the day. Would you do anything different to what
I have? other than digging it up and taking it home. Put your answers in the
comment section below, so that we can all learn from each other.
I'm Tony O'Neill this is UK Here We Grow and remember
folks you Reap What You Sow. I will see you in the next one. bye, bye.