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The banana plant is the largest herbaceous flowering plant. [2] All the above-ground parts of a banana plant grow from a structure called a corm. [3] Plants are normally tall and fairly sturdy with a treelike appearance, but what appears to be a trunk is actually a pseudostem composed of multiple leaf-stalks .
Of California's total plant population, 2,153 species, subspecies, and varieties are endemic and native to California alone, according to the 1993 Jepson Manual study. [4] This botanical diversity stems not only from the size of the state, but also its diverse topographies , climates, and soils (e.g. serpentine outcrops ).
The same term is also used to describe the plants on which the bananas grow. They include commercially important cultivars like ' Dwarf Cavendish ' (1888) and ' Grand Nain ' (the " Chiquita banana"). Since the 1950s, these cultivars have been the most internationally traded bananas. [ 1 ]
Banana plants are among the largest extant herbaceous plants, some reaching up to 9 m (30 ft) in height or 18 m (59 ft) in the case of Musa ingens.The large herb is composed of a modified underground stem (), a false trunk or pseudostem formed by the basal parts of tightly rolled leaves, a network of roots, and a large flower spike.
Musaceae is a family of flowering plants composed of three genera with about 91 known species, [3] placed in the order Zingiberales. The family is native to the tropics of Africa and Asia. The plants have a large herbaceous growth habit with leaves with overlapping basal sheaths that form a pseudostem making some members appear to be woody trees.
Most banana cultivars which exhibit purely or mostly Musa acuminata genomes are dessert bananas, while hybrids of M. acuminata and M. balbisiana are mostly cooking bananas or plantains. [23] Musa acuminata is one of the earliest plants to be domesticated by humans for agriculture, 7,000 years ago in New Guinea and Wallacea. [24]
It is assumed that wild bananas were cooked and eaten, as farmers would not have developed the cultivated banana otherwise. Seeded Musa balbisiana fruit are called butuhan ('with seeds') in the Philippines, [7] and kluai tani (กล้วยตานี) in Thailand, [8] where its leaves are used for packaging and crafts. [9]
Radopholus similis is a species of nematode known commonly as the burrowing nematode. [1] It is a parasite of plants, and it is a pest of many agricultural crops. It is an especially important pest of bananas, and it can be found on coconut, avocado, coffee, sugarcane, other grasses, and ornamentals.