Kent

Most of us in this part of California have been moaning about how cold the summer has been. Well, be careful what you ask for! Where I live about 50 miles north of San Francisco, we went from a high of 71 to a high of 107 in just three days. The forecast for today was only supposed to be 98. The forecast for tomorrow is 100; I hope that doesn’t mean we’ll hit 109. I'm afraid of what I may find when I get home from work tomorrow.

I have an 18" pseudo-stem Dwarf Orinoco pup that I potted just over a week ago. Looks like I’ve lost all three leaves, but I’m hopeful the plant will survive. Two much smaller Gold Finger pups, which I potted a week earlier in an effort to save, seem to be doing OK. Their mother died two winters ago, bad frost, bad location, and possibly a gopher, and the two pups haven’t taken off. Figured it was time to intervene. I also have a Mona Lisa with two pups that seems to have weathered the heat so far. All these were planted in ground on the north side of my backyard. I don’t think they are getting enough sun. My neighbors recently ripped out several large shrubs that were shading the small plot along side my driveway. I am planning to relocate all the bananas there. I figured I would also plant them in half wine barrels, which is what I had originally planned for the backyard. I’m looking for the barrels to provide gopher protection and improved drainage. Has anyone experimented with using CHC for banana growing media? I also plan to leave one pup of each type in 5 gal. nursery containers to over winter in the garage as insurance against another severe December cold snap.

Besides the bananas, several recently repotted citrus are looking a bit ragged. A Moro blood orange seedling in a citrus liner pot looks like its going to lose all its leaves. And it was in a location where it only got sun for half the day. To add insult to injury, my heirloom tomatoes are showing significant signs of sun burned fruit. It hurts to go from green to brown without hardly any mature fruit. Oh well, I’ve watered everything well again for the third night in a row.

Kent

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Kent
a.k.a. SonomaCitrus

cherokee_greg

109 here today in Fresno when I get off work im going right home and staying in. Too Hot. Well its always hot here in Fresno.

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Greg zone 9 Fresno,CA
http://gardenjot.com/garden/view/1980/Gregs-Banana-Farm

harveyc

I just got back from Nicaragua early Sunday morning and started irrigating alfalfa a few hours later. I can't avoid the heat entirely but did get most of the shoveling work done in the morning so I wouldn't have to do that in the hottest part of the day. I moved one set just before midnight last night and it was fairly pleasant then. With the full moon, it's tempting to try to do all of the chores at night.

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alexizhere19

Keep the plants in shade for a couple weeks during intense heat especially and keep moist.

And you always keep yourself cool too,

best of luck

alex

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woo woo woo in the county jail

just a good ole boy never meanin no harm

Velutina

Wow, that's hotter than here! It's been about 106F, but that's nothing unusual. It hit 116F at my house this year and fried all my bananas.

EDIT: Oh, my weather underground banner says it's 109F here. Still about 8 degrees above normal for this time of year.

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Adam

Kent

Fortunately we only hit 99 today and then it started cooling. Tomorrow is looking like 80 or so, which would be average for this time of year. It also looks like we are headed back below normal for the weekend.

I probably should have kept the potted DO on the north side of the house were it had been the past week, but I didn’t expect the high yesterday to shoot 9 or 10 degrees past the forecasted high, at least not this summer. The stem looks fine for now. I’ll know better in a week or two. We tend to have warm weather into October and sometimes November, so there is plenty of time for the plant to recover before we starting seeing temps dip below 40. About the only things I expect to lose are the biggest tomatoes and a few peppers. Just the fruits, the plants appear OK. I think even the Moro will make it, but it is going to need to be nursed for awhile.

But back to the question about CHC, has anyone used it for potted bananas? Except for occasional rough transplanting on my part, my citrus really like it. I would think the qualities that let citrus roots thrive, moisture retention without root suffocation, would also be ideal for bananas. Kind of like potting in compost, but I have to supply the nutrients.

Kent

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Kent
a.k.a. SonomaCitrus