Hi Stan,

I'm in South Florida and just pulled one out of the ground.

You're right the leaves are very attractive, and the fruit is even more so but... they grow very large, give up fruit sparingly and the thin and beautiful emerald green fruits stay hard and never ripen, at least in my yard. Once I pulled the two or three largest hands to see if they'd ripen and they did not.

Also the korm gets very large as it's an aggressive grower so if you plan on keeping it in a pot I don't think it will work.

Well,that's not good to hear. I knew from the get go,ripe banana's in a climate of 75f summers wouldn't be easy. The large size thing is not something here in the SF bay area I would have to worry about. Only the ornamental Ensente banana's get huge here.
But,the plants are said to be cold tolerant- although that doesn't always mean the fruit are.
Well,plant it where it should do best and look good..for now.
Thanks!

I have one (or a clump) in my back yard in Westchester (West Los Angeles), and it has never grown large. It gets plenty of water and food but will not grow tall, even after three years.

They are NOT cold tolerant. A couple of winters ago, we had the coldest winter in many years, and when the temperature down to 36 degrees, the tips of the leaves turned brown. I probably had the tree in the coldest part of the yard, as the tomatoes and basil next the the house were not affected, and I grow tomatoes every winter (when they do best for me).

Try growing a cherimoya instead - I have been having better luck with that and I am getting fruit on mine now.

Lars

The reasons I stopped growing bananas is:

They like light, heat, water, and food. Here in Florida that makes them grow REALLY FAST!

Remove any of the four above and they S-L-O-W down. Unfortunately in Florida they get lots of the four and they become unmanageable too fast.

My other banana trees grow really fast - only the ice cream banana has been slow. I am thinking that my soil is my problem, however.

Lars