Scott Swanson
Don Ross admits he wasn’t expecting much when he planted a banana tree “start” in his front yard in Meridian Heights.
Ross had been living in Washougal, Wash. after managing the Sweet Home Sprouse-Reitz store for years, and had a neighbor who’d been a missionary in Africa.
“He’d spent most of his life in Africa and he moved in across the street,” said Ross. “He brought a start back and a couple of years after he had it, he gave me a start.”
When Ross moved back to Sweet Home eight years ago, he brought the start along in a pot and stuck it on the hillside next to his home.
It grew.
When the plant started to break the ground, in the middle of that first July, Ross noted that it seemed to be doing fairly well.
“I came out and I was like, how much did this grow?” he said. He staked the plant and measured it. It grew 12 ½ inches in 24 hours. “It was unreal,” Ross said.
The plant dies down every winter, but comes back in the spring, he said.
The recommended climate for bananas, according to the website http://www.banana-tree.com, is “Constant warmth” – “the ideal night temperature would be 67 F. The day temperatures would be in the 80s.” High humidity is also recommended.
But according to the Oregon Association of Nurseries, gardeners in the milder areas of Oregon have had success growing palm and banana trees, despite the chilly winters. Nurseries have been selling increasing amounts of both.
This year, for the first time, Ross’s tree actually produced a blossom and some tiny bananas.
“Somebody told me that in this area, they just don’t bloom,” he said. “You would think it would need a lot of water. I don’t water it. It just does its thing.”