barna

More and more initially unknown Musas seems to belong to the M. itinerans ‘complex’

Some imported seeds of Ensete turned to be a different species that was initially named as Musa ’Yunnan’ and later:

Musa itinerans ‘Yunnan’

A nice blue banana becomes available as Musa “Burmese Blue’ and now is classified as:

Musa itinerans var guangdongensis

A giant banana from Yunnan was commercial available as Musa itinerans ‘Gigantea’ and now is reclassified as:

Musa itinerans var. xishuangbannaensis (I am not sure if it is now a full species)

Last a nice middle red-stripe leaves banana is now available as

(sunshine seeds)
Musa itinerans ‘Indian Form’

Are there any other Musa itinerans variety?

The only adult M. itinerans I have is ‘Yunnan’ and has proved me to be hard in my zone 9a.I would like to know if the other forms could be as cold hardy as this one.

Any experience?

Gabe15

There are currently 6 varieties being processed to be published next year. They are not official yet though.

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Growing bananas in Colorado, Washington, Hawaii since 2004. Commercial banana farmer, 200+ varieties.

mrbungalow

Sorry, I couldn't help noticing the soil you are using for the banana in the photo. Looks a bit compact and clay-ish. Have you tried soil with a bit more organic matter and compost? I bet this would make a huge difference in terms of growth. Not that your plant looks bad though...

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bigdog

That's actually the picture from sunshine seeds website, Erlend! I agree...soil looks kinda gooey to me!

I've got seeds from the India form. The only one I don't have is Burmese Blue.

barna

Hi Gabe,

You always have the latest news regarding banana taxonomy.
From the four M. itinerans forms I mentioned two are subspecies (because you have not correct me I assume xishuangbannaensis is not a full species ) and two are varieties or cultivars.
Does this cultivars are linked to any of the existing or new proposed subspecies?

Hi Erlend,

I agree with you that the soil looks too compact.. .but it is no mine (Thank you in any case for your advice)
I am using for all my potted bananas (also for my heliconias and aroids) a mixture of 1/3 perlite and 2/3 ‘Compo’ substrate so I can easy control de moisture level. What are you using for yours?

Hi Bigdog,

I have an adult M. itinerans ‘Yunnan’


a 10 cm. seedling M. itinerans ‘Indian Form’ and seeds of M. ‘Burmese Blue’ and M. itinerans ‘Gigantea’.
I am very interested to know what your experience is regarding the cold-hardiness of the ones you have
Good luck with your seeds ¡¡¡

Gabe15

There are no cultivars or subspecies, at this point they are all to be published as varieties. There was recently published a Musa itinerans ssp. annamica which will be changed to Musa itinerans var. annamica, same with M. itinerans 'Gigantae', this (in addition to Musa sp. 'Big Flower') are Musa itinerans var. xishuangbannaensis, I would imagine this one to be the 'Yunnan'. The India form could possibly be the orginal species, Musa itinerans var. itinerans, the species as a whole as a rather large range however. It is important to remeber that the names seed dealers give plants really means nothing, the only way to know what they are is to grow them out yourself because many of them are misidentified from the start.

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Growing bananas in Colorado, Washington, Hawaii since 2004. Commercial banana farmer, 200+ varieties.

tropicalkid

I happen to have a 6" "burmese blue" TC plant, and happened to withstand 40 degrees temps. that we had in NC this past week. I already have moved all the bananas to a more protected environment though

Carlos

Mark Hall

Does anyone know of another site other than sunshine seeds that are selling itinerans Indian form as my german is crap and I can't understand any of it.

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Time Flies like an Arrow.....Fruit flies like a Banana.

barna

Hi all,

Thank you Gabe, for clarifying the varieties question.
I think M. itinerans Yunnan’ is not Musa itinerans var. xishuangbannaensis but a smaller form. Some people said it coul be the same banana as M. yunnanensis but I have both and it do not seems it to me. I will try to post a picture with both plants side by side.
I get my M. ‘Yunnan’ in 2001 from Kobakoba in UK and this was the available information at that time:

“This is an enigmatic plant, no-one yet knows quite what it is¡. The seed of this banana species was collected “at high altitude” in Yunnan province in China and offered to Toby Spanner (..) as Musa wilsonii. Toby (..) gave it the provisional name ‘Yunnan’ pending formal identification.”
‘Yunnan’ is an attractive slender plant with distinctive blue-green leaves on long petioles and a somewhat waxy peseudostern. The undersides of leaves of leaves on some plants have a distinct red flush when young,”

Some time later it was identified as a Musa itinerans

Here is a link with some additional information: http://www.rarepalmseeds.com/pix/MusIti.shtml

Unfortunately my plant nearly died during a very cold winter two years ago and although recovered, has not yet flowered.

Thank you Carlos, for the information regarding the cold-hardiness of Musa BB. I hope it could also survive with a few less degrees, I can have lower temperatures (-5ºC / 23ºF) some few days during winter

Mark, http://www.tropengarten.com/ is also selling M. itinerans seeds from India but it is also in German.
Instate of ordering the seeds trough the sun-shine on-line shop you can e -mail them in english at info@sunshine-seeds.de (I did it in the past asking for additional questions).

bigdog

I have emailed sunshine-seeds with my order before, and it worked out great.

Barna, I gave two plants of Musa itinerans (Yunnan) to a friend of mine in Nashville, TN last year. They made it through last winter just fine, although Nashville had a mild winter. I believe their absolute low last winter was around 12F (-11C). They died back to the corms, and resprouted from new pups in the Spring. The old growing points were killed. The corm doesn't appear to have sustained any damage though, and here are the plants as of early October of this year:

Tropicallvr

So what one is the one that agristarts has in tissue culture?
I noticed on the Jungle seeds site(UK) they are selling Musa itinerans 'Yunnan', and it is one they got from Nature products as Musa yunnanenisis. Gabe, have you compared the yunnaninsis you got from nature products to the one going around as M.itinerans?

Burmese blue is a sweet plant, and to me it looks exactly like(only smaller) Musa itinerans var xishuangbannaensis.

Gabe15

Musa yunnanensis and Musa itinerans are distinct, but I suppose it could be hard to tell them apart when young until they flower. However I will note that when my M. yunnanensis was young, it had coloration very much like that picture posted here as Musa itinerans 'Indian Form', I am not saying they are the same at all, but it had that type of coloration. From time to time now it will have the entire back side of the leaf be red as its growing for a few days but then it turns green, but when it was young it had bright red midribs and undersides sometimes, it would come and go.

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Growing bananas in Colorado, Washington, Hawaii since 2004. Commercial banana farmer, 200+ varieties.

bigdog

Kyle, the one that Agri-Starts has in tc is the one in the picture I posted. It came indirectly from Agri-Starts. Their pictures and description are of Musa itinerans var. xishuangbannaensis, however. Several other banana sites have duplicated this error as well.

Tropicallvr

Thanks for the info Gabe and Frank.
I hope to get some of the Indian form to sprout in the future.
BTW, nice pics bigdog and barna!