Showing posts with label baby bananas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label baby bananas. Show all posts

Sunday, December 11, 2016

Baby Bananas

So after TC Winston there was a banana drought in Fiji....as in for a good 2 or 3 months NO bananas anywhere. It was so weird....since growing up you always could get bananas. Apparently the storm badly damage the trees and wiped out any fruit that was growing on trees. We even had some growing when we moved in that was bad. Bananas started coming back but prices were insane at first ($20FJD for half a hand of bananas).....thankfully they are back down to $5FJD for a hand of bananas!

The yard at our new house has a number of banana trees, so we patiently waited for something to occur. Finally, in the beginning of September we had a bloom.


Up close of the bloom (9/3 actually)


The next day the bloom was starting to open!


On 9/7 - you can already see two hands of bananas


On 9/9 - looks like about six hand of bananas already! Everyday more petals are falling off.


On 9/15 - the flower continues to open but the little miniature bananas just fall off. I guess our tree doesn't have enough root fuel to produce any more hands.


Same day, just a different angle.


On 9/22 - still dropping petals and miniature bananas. The other hands of bananas continue to grow.


On 11/3 - oops....I have failed to take any banana shots in October, not much excitement going on. The bananas have continued to grow and more petals have fallen off the flower.


On 11/12 - still very green bananas. Not much flower left. As you notice, the banana tree itself is starting to die. Once a banana tree fruits, it dies but it has sent how rhizomes that grow into new trees.


Close up of the beauties....dreaming of all the smoothies we will make.


On 11/25 - the day before our gardener cut the bananas down! He then put the bananas in our shed in a plastic bag so the gas they give off would help speed up the last of the ripening. He then dug up/took out the rest of the tree.


On 12/9 - though not super yellow they are ready to eat. This is our first crop (less two hands...one that we'd already started eating and one we'd given to Malika). So once we spot a bloom, we now know it will be about 3 months till we have banana overload!


Friday, February 5, 2016

Backyard Flora: Fiji Edition


Warning: This post contains lots of photos of flowers....if you don't like pretty things, don't read :)

So as I mentioned in a previous post, we moved into some temporary housing. Our house is not quite ready and this house is getting ready to leave the housing pool so it works out well for us. It is tricky in that you want to unpack everything and get settled, but I know we move again in a few weeks....so we have a mountain of suitcases in the corner of the den (no use looking for somewhere to stash them), one of which is a under sink cabinet of sorts ("Mom, I'm out of xyz", "get a new one out of the gray suit case"). So with no unpacking to do, why not piddle around the yard taking pictures of flowers and then share them.....

The yard at our temporary house is beautifully landscaped with all kinds of flowers and plants. We have not seen the yard at our permanent house (we did drive by our final house and it appears there are some papaya trees in the yard there....so hopefully we will be pleasantly surprised with some flowers there as well). Most of the plants in this yard I can identify....thanks to the internet. Enjoy.

Orchid

Ginger Lily


Kings Mantle
Mexican Petunia
Bird of Paradise (I think)

Ixora Flowers
Fancy Hibiscus (or Chinese Lantern Hibiscus)
Different colors of Ixora Flowers
Hibiscus


Lime Tree - Limeade anyone?
Banana Tree
Can't wait till they are ripe!


Banana Flower and Baby Bananas

Possibly another type of Hibiscus 

Flame Tree (or Christmas Tree) - Neighbor's tree but covers a good portion of our yard

Technically in the neighbors yard...but can be seen from ours.
Coming up next.....backyard fauna.....