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“I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.”
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“There are three kinds of men.
The ones that learn by readin’.
The few who learn by observation.
The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence for themselves.”
― Will Rogers

Veinte Cohol

* small bunches - not worth harvesting

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Pancrazio

Cool topic!
I have been experimenting with this cultivar since the last two years, when i have been able to receive a couple of corms.
I grow it in ground from the end of April to the late August/early September, keeping in pot for the rest of the year.
When i ground it gets a lot of sunlight without any problem. My summer temps however are moderate, ranging between 25 and 36°C as max, and with an average of about 30°C daily max and 15-17°C as night temps. When indoor, it gets a very small quantity of sunlight (west window closed during most of the daylight hours) but it shows just a limited decline. Smaller plant do behave better indoor.
Since i got my first flower during this winter i can also comment on plant flowering height with my method: my plant flowered at almost exactly 120 cm of height and 32 cm of circumference at the base. I did find that the measurement of circumference is in good accordance with those written by doc. Fonsah on a paper on this subject, while height is slightly smaller, and i wonder if that may mean that my plant is stressed.

The plant did put out a fair number of suckers during growth, but i haven't determined the best moment to release one for the ratoon crop. I'm assuming sometimes when the plant is about 90 cm tall.

To keep the transplant and winter cover easy, I'm forced to practice the "single stem" growth, so i can't really comment on ratoon crops.

My plant have endured a single night with a minimum temperature of 5°C and they did very well after, so I'm assuming that this is the minimum temperature that this plant can sustain, at least as single night event. I will stick with the suggestion to keep veinte cohol above 10°C but occasional dips on lower temperatures won't kill a healthy relatively dry plant.

On last note, i do think (but i have not any data to back me up, that's just my opinion!) that this plant has a slightly higher optimum temperature compared to Orinoco and Namwah, it may be very fast, but to express all its speed, it needs higher temperatures. It does well in temperate climates, but the summer needs to be reasonably warm. I wouldn't suggest this for a grower in UK, this is what i mean, growth-wise. But I do think, that a grower in a continental climate can do pretty well with this one. Flowering is, of course, completely another matter.

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PR-Giants

VC can be a short plant, but collecting circumference measurements at the base is an example of poor judgment. 100 cm is the standard but if your plants flower below that height, then I would chose a different "standard height" but not at the base.

As far as a plant falling into the group of 'equal or greater girth at a lesser height', I would interpret that as healthier & less stressed.

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Pancrazio

Actually this is a new way to see the matter, I never thought of this.

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PR-Giants

Are you sure the paper you're referring to measured the circumference at the base?

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Nicolas Naranja

Seems to be a lot of people with PhDs making mistakes.

In a banana nursery, measurements at the base are standard. http://journals.cambridge.org/downlo...84a553e6b92ef1

In this paper Revista Brasileira de Fruticultura - Development and production of banana plant 'grande naine' under different planting densities in reagions with natural occurrence of black leaf streak and this paper http://www.bdigital.unal.edu.co/3564...69820-2-PB.pdf it is at 30 cm.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...85970519,d.eXY is at 10cm.

http://www.ijset.net/journal/278.pdf at 5cm

Bioline International Official Site (site up-dated regularly) at 50 and 100 cm


I can't find a paper that actually correlates a certain height of measurement with yield.

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PR-Giants

Sometimes life requires the use of some Common Sense.

Common Sense - nursery plants need a lower standard measurement.

Common Sense - Dwarfs that bloom near or under 100 cm need a lower standard measurement.

For 20 years I used 75 cm as my standard and it worked fine until I wanted to compare my results to local studies done by pesky PhD wielding banana scientists that used 100 cm as their standard.

Most people including banana scientists can readily see that because of the shape of the base an elevated measurement is more reliable.

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Nicolas Naranja

The number of dwarf bananas that bloom at or under 100cm is pretty infininitesimal. Use whatever you want for yourself, but plenty of intelligent people take measurements at different heights. A single height of pseudo stem diameter would likely only correlate to plant health for a certain variety.

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PR-Giants

Realizing there's nitpickers here, I chose to use the broader range of "near or under" and not "at or under".



Banana scientists from around the world agreed on 100 cm because they realized the benefits of sharing data using a common format.

I have no doubt there's people out there smarter than everyone else that use their own format and have no need to share data.

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Nicolas Naranja

Where and when did they agree on 100 cm? A lot of the literature I linked to was recent. You must have a source to have decided on 100 cm for yourself, but just because other researchers don't choose 100 cm, does not make them poor amateurs.

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Pancrazio

Found the paper. No mention of height of measurement whatsoever.
I did assume that it was taken at the base because, it looks to me, this is the only "point of interest" where datas can be confronted no matter what, but i can see your reasons.

Actually, in forestry, measurements are taken, as standard, at 130 cm from the ground. In this case that height has been chosen for easiness and to take measurements quicker. In bananas this doesn't seems so necessary (as far as i know) because i assumed that, outside from scientific studies, banana measurements are pretty uncommon?

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PR-Giants

Girth at 100 cm has been standard for decades and authors generally expect a certain level of competence from the reader.

My first reply to you was a way of saying there's something amiss.

Clearly your plant was not healthier and would not have the larger girth.

The plants in the study produced healthy bunches and that would not have been possible with a base circumference of 32 cm.

My second reply attempted to point out exactly where your error was.

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International Network for the Improvement of Banana and Plantain - INIBAP

Home / CGIAR

CIRAD - Agricultural Research for Development

NARO: National Agricultural Research Organisation



United States Department of Agriculture 'USDA' - Tropical Agriculture Research Station 'TARS'



Bioversity International

Musa Germplasm Information System

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@ Pancrazio

We discussed speeding up the growth cycle of the Veinte Cohol on another thread, here's what it looks like.

I'll be separating and replanting the 1st Generation plants later in the week to jump start more 2nd Generation plants.

This technique shortens the time from planting to shooting and the time from shooting to harvest and it also yields the larger ratoon bunch.

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Nicolas Naranja

You do realize, I hope, that the value of 100cm is totally arbitrary. No research ties that particular height of measurement to yield. Nothing at all obliges scientist to use a measurement of 100cm. If anything it would probably be better to measure at a certain proportion of final height. It doesn't really make sense to measure a Kandrian at the same height as a Veinte Cohol.

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PR-Giants

You do realize you're wrong and that your whole argument is based on a fallacy.

The brightest minds realized the need for a standardized height, and chose 100 cm, it's a single measurement that reflected meaningful data from the short plants all the way up to the very tall plants.

Yes, they could have chosen 3.14159 to the forth power or any number within their acceptable range, but they chose 100, maybe because it's an easy number to remember.

Don't get confused over the number, because what's important is it being meaningful and standardized.

When a measurement is standard, readers can easily relate the data from one study to another.

After reading your "solution" it's easy to see why you can't understand.

Taking a measurement at a certain proportion of final height is really foolish and all you'll have is a bunch of useless data taken at various heights which is exactly what they wanted to avoid.

The United States Department of Agriculture measures at the standard 100 cm and they don't even mention the height they just expect a certain level of competence from the reader.

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This thread was intended to compare the Veinte Cohol to other short cycle cultivars and to highlight some of the problems people experience with growing it. I never expected it to go off on a tangent about the importance of standardized measurements, but as you'll see these measurements are very helpful when comparing bananas.

The pseudostem diameter of 13 cm at the standard height of 100 cm for the Patupi in the TARS photo and the 12 cm average of my plant crops are good indications of a small and lightweight banana plant. The Veinte Cohol I grow are much bigger (plant crop 14.7 cm) with about a 50% heavier pseudostem.

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Pancrazio

Hey, here i am.

Yes, I do remember that topic.
Let me see if i do understand correctly what you do with your method:

1) You get a plant of VC and let it grow
2) Once you get pups from that plant, you let the most vigorous one grow as much as you can
3) When that pup is big enough, you remove the mother plant and plant it somewhere else (i don't get this: why you need to remove that? do they hinder the flowering of the second generation pup? Or do they make a better job by producing some more 2nd generation pup somewhere else?)
4) You wait for the flowering of the pup that should do a better/early bunch, since it got a jump start from the mother plant.

I do think that your method is interesting but I've got to find a way to use it at a northern, colder, place. My issue is that in my humble opinion, plants need a couple of moths before bringing them indoor, where you don't disturb them in any way. Surviving winter months indoor in a dark room is stressful enough and a plant can't do that if it also has to rebuild its root system.
Since i pot my plant in august, i can just get 4 months where i can grow the pup: then the pup has to be potted up just as the mother plant. I don't know it it may retain all the advantage taken growing this way. I must attempt it first.
And i really should start writing down some data.

BTW your experience with Patupi is very interesting. I do think that people in nothern climate should be very interested by your result.
As for now apparently it seems to me that people outside tropic have 3 main roads to grow bananas. The best one depends from the environment
1) If the winter is mild enough they can plant a fair number of cold tolerant varieties and hope for some plant to flower early (works better in places with milder long winter, with springs that may be cool)
2) If the winter is harsh but short, i do think that best results can happen with the dormant storage. But you need a place where the soil keeps warm even during the cold snaps, and your plants should get a warm spring, otherwise will recover too late and you will lose a year.
3)If none of the above methods apply, you've got to try with short cycle bananas and pot growing.

Spring heat however, to me, is a key factor in deciding which strategy may work better for any particular case.

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Nicolas Naranja

First off, scientists at the USDA or CIRAD are really no different than me. They spent a whole lot of time in school and did a whole lot of research over their careers. You really shouldn't put as much faith in scientists to actually justify why they are measuring at a certain height. If you don't mention the height, that is poor science writing. As demonstrated, other people measure at other heights and actually say it. Rule 1 when writing scientific literature, justify it. They just chose a number. For forest trees, it is DBH, but it is actually at a different height and they grow much differently than bananas. I'll have PhD behind my name in 5 months, it won't mean that I am any smarter than I am today, and it won't mean that my arbitrary decisions carry any more weight than they do today. There is no rhyme of reason other than it being easy to remember. And for a descriptor, the measurement is pretty poor as it is influenced by environment. It's best use is probably as a dividend for height to come up with a ratio of height to p-stem diameter which is probably a descriptor that isn't too terribly influenced by environmental factors.

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