How Bananas Are Grown. Banana plants are often mistaken for trees or palms – they are actually herbs. The banana is a perennial plant that replaces itself. Bananas do not grow from a seed but from a bulb or rhizome, and it takes 9 to 12 months from sowing a banana bulb to harvesting the fruit.
How are bananas grown without seeds?
Farmers propagate banana plants through vegetative reproduction rather than seeds. These plants grow from thick, underground stems called rhizomes. The rhizome spreads and grows new buds and shoots near the base of the mature plant. The farmer removes these pups and plants them elsewhere on the farm.
How do bananas grow and end up in the store?
They form from a rhizome, which is an underground stem. There is a main “trunk” that sprouts up from underground that produces the banana cluster. While growing, there are other suckers that sprout up from the underground stem. Once the banana cluster has been produced, that stem will no longer produce anymore fruit.
How bananas are harvested and packed?
Bananas are harvested by hand. When the fruit is ripe the stems are cut down and wet sponges are placed in between the bananas to protect them from bumps and bruising. The bananas are then covered in blue bags to keep insects at bay and carried by cable across the fields to be washed and packed.
