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Frankco · 05-20-2009, 01:45 PM

Hi ArchAngeL01,

Plant tissue culture isn't really all that hard and tissue culturing banana, at least from what I have found, is a lot easier than most plants. I tissue culture plants in a spare bedroom, just to keep the cats out. You could set up a small area in your living room, kitchen or were ever you have enough space for a small desk and some shelves to place your jars. In a short order you can have more banana plants than you know what to do with. In just 2 and ½ months from one Musa Basjoo I now have 80 small explants. In another 2 months I should have 256. I should have in 4 months, if account for 10% not making it, somewhere around 4000, that is if I can get enough jars:-)

My room is definitely not sterile as a hospital! I use a 30 gal aquarium set on its side to give me the sterile area in which to work with the plants. It’s cheap, easy to setup and works as well as an expensive laminar flow hood.
Most of the stuff you need you can get at a thrift store or garage sales. The most expensive thing you need is a pressure cooker to sterilize your media/jars. You can do it in a microwave but it can be a little tricky and can be messy if you are not careful. If you use a microwave you should add a couple of jars extra to act as heat sinks. This keeps your media from bubbling over too quickly.

As for bananas, I found you need very little lighting but need warmth (76-82 deg F). Actually at the start, when you stick the first banana in the jar, keeping it under very low light helps so, having lights setup isn’t necessary at the beginning. When you first start a Banana, it has a tendency to turn black under strong lights because of the phenolic extrudes. Low light helps with this problem. You will need to take the little banana explant out of the first jar and switch it to a new jar about once a week until the phenolic extrudes stop (about 4 or 5 times). After that it’s clear sailing.

Almost a year ago I started to make some videos on how I got started with micropropagation. I have changed and improved the way I do things since then but, the videos will give you an idea on how to do some of the things. The videos don't cover bananas but an African violet. I'll try to do one on bananas in the future. If you want to see the videos you can do a search on YouTube for micropropagation. There are 11 videos, I think:-)

Frank

05-20-2009, 01:45 PM	#8 (permalink)
Frankco Frankco's Photo Gallery Join Date: Jan 2009 Posts: 91 BananaBucks : 6,666 Feedback: 0 / 0% Said "Thanks" 4 Times Was Thanked 37 Times in 18 Posts Said "Welcome to Bananas" 0 Times	Re: what exactly is tissue culture? Hi ArchAngeL01, Plant tissue culture isn't really all that hard and tissue culturing banana, at least from what I have found, is a lot easier than most plants. I tissue culture plants in a spare bedroom, just to keep the cats out. You could set up a small area in your living room, kitchen or were ever you have enough space for a small desk and some shelves to place your jars. In a short order you can have more banana plants than you know what to do with. In just 2 and ½ months from one Musa Basjoo I now have 80 small explants. In another 2 months I should have 256. I should have in 4 months, if account for 10% not making it, somewhere around 4000, that is if I can get enough jars:-) My room is definitely not sterile as a hospital! I use a 30 gal aquarium set on its side to give me the sterile area in which to work with the plants. It’s cheap, easy to setup and works as well as an expensive laminar flow hood. Most of the stuff you need you can get at a thrift store or garage sales. The most expensive thing you need is a pressure cooker to sterilize your media/jars. You can do it in a microwave but it can be a little tricky and can be messy if you are not careful. If you use a microwave you should add a couple of jars extra to act as heat sinks. This keeps your media from bubbling over too quickly. As for bananas, I found you need very little lighting but need warmth (76-82 deg F). Actually at the start, when you stick the first banana in the jar, keeping it under very low light helps so, having lights setup isn’t necessary at the beginning. When you first start a Banana, it has a tendency to turn black under strong lights because of the phenolic extrudes. Low light helps with this problem. You will need to take the little banana explant out of the first jar and switch it to a new jar about once a week until the phenolic extrudes stop (about 4 or 5 times). After that it’s clear sailing. Almost a year ago I started to make some videos on how I got started with micropropagation. I have changed and improved the way I do things since then but, the videos will give you an idea on how to do some of the things. The videos don't cover bananas but an African violet. I'll try to do one on bananas in the future. If you want to see the videos you can do a search on YouTube for micropropagation. There are 11 videos, I think:-) Frank __________________ Frankco Zone 5 N.W. Indiana