3 Responses to “SINGING IN THE RAIN…”

  1. Allee Willis

    Yes, sun out in LA!! Though exceedingly windy and cold. Might go down to freezing tonight which is really rare here. I’m spending part of the day wrapping all my plants outside. The cold got all the banana trees once and it took years for all the leaves come back.

    Umbrella is great Seems like an obvious idea so surprised I haven’t seen one of these earlier. Though I have no patience for regular sized umbrellas. It has to be a golf umbrella or I’d rather get wet.

    Is there a year on it anywhere?

  2. BRBill

    Ah, bananas. I have a bit of experience as a banana farmer. There were 3 plants when i moved into my house. Now i have a plantation. At least that’s what i call the place, The Banana Plantation. Your plants will get gotten by the cold, ie freezing temps. A hard freeze will kill them, for the year. A short regular freeze will just sorta brown the ends of the leaves. Just cut the dead leaves off in the spring or cut the plant off a foot or so above the ground and they will grow back. The only time a plant won’t grow back is when it produces fruit. Cut and mulch that one. You can transplant the “pups” which grow out from the bases of the plants, that’s how i got the “plantation” and back corner of the yard overrun with plants. The plants i have are large, not the small ornamentals. Mine produce fruit in good very hot years, tho not this year. Last year all were killed due to a seriously cold winter. I cut them all back and started from the ground up, so to speak, this year. The big burgundy/amythest colored flowers the fruit comes from are cool. All stalks/bunches produced are impaled on nails on the back of the bathroom door and allowed to ripen. Yard bananas, sweeter than yer normal chiquita…
    And i have seen umbrellas like the one shown tho i can’t remember where. For cool umbrellas, try googling “Second Line umbrellas” and see what the pulls up.

    • Allee Willis

      My banana trees are over 30 feet tall. Birds of paradise too. So brown leaves going all the way up definitely take their toll. I consider myself a banana farmer too!