Herbs in the Landscape

 Banana (genus Musa)

The bananas are considered the tallest herbs in the world because they lack woody stalks. Bananas are huge herbaceous plants with succulent, flesh, upright stalks from which large, oblong, bright green leaves grow. The plant can grow 2-30 feet tall and 1-15 feet wide. Showy flowers appear typically i the spring, giving way to fleshy, elongated, green or yellow fruit. They are hardy in USDA zones 9-11.

The banana plant can grow in the St. Louis region, though it takes several months for a banana to flower. There are many varieties to grow. Some gardeners grow dwarf banana plants in tubs so they can be brought inside for the winter. Others dig the root balls and store them over winter in the basement. In St. Louis it can take two to three years before a plants gets large enough to flower and fruit.

Use a rich, well-drained soil, with plenty of organic material when growing in a large pot that is at least 15-fallons or larger. When planting outside, dig a large hole at least 2 feet wide by 2 feet deep and fill it with rich organic soil . Bananas prefer a sunny location and moist, but not soggy, soil. Banana plants do best when planted in groups fairly close together, as this helps to retain leaf moisture. Temperatures below 60ºF will slow growth. Frost causes the plants to die back to the ground. They are heavy feeders of fertilizer.

The banana peel has been used on splinters to loosen foreign fragments and heal the wound. It can be nubbed on skin to remove ink stains and soothe insect bites. The versatile peel also can polish shoes, dust plants, fill scratches on DVDs and CDs, and whiten teeth. Banana peels have been used for water purification, ethanol production, and as a fertilizer. They are often part of feedstock for cattle, goats, pigs, and poultry.

Carl Linnaeus recommended boiling bananas with sugar to cure anger, mashing bananas with honey to soothe eye inflammation, and crushing banana root soaked in milk to alleviate dizziness.

And, of course, banana is edible, raw or cooked. Consider baking some banana bread.

Banana lamps, banana bowls, and banana jewelry can be found at the international Banana Museum in Mecca, California that boast 17,000 banana-themed artifacts and is listed in Guinness World Records as the “largest collection devoted to any one fruit.”