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It is one of the major pests of bananas and plantains that attacks leaves and stems. [9] Adults are attracted to the plant through the volatiles released by the banana. Infestation starts with 5-month-old plants. An early symptom is appearing small pinhead-sized holes on the stem and fibrous extrusions from the bases of leaf petioles.
Ensete ventricosum, commonly known as enset or ensete, Ethiopian banana, Abyssinian banana, [3] pseudo-banana, false banana and wild banana, [4] is a species of flowering plant in the banana family Musaceae. The domesticated form of the plant is cultivated only in Ethiopia, where it provides the staple food for approximately 20 million people.
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 ().
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.
Banana pith or banana stem, is a vegetable harvested from the starchy inner core of banana pseudostems. It is used similarly to heart of palms in the cuisines of the Philippines , Malaysia , Indochina , Sri Lanka , Myanmar and southern India .
The 1753 name Musa paradisiaca L. for plantains and Musa sapientum L. for dessert bananas are now known to refer to hybrids, rather than natural species. It is known today that most cultivated seedless bananas are hybrids or polyploids of two wild banana species - Musa acuminata and Musa balbisiana .
The above-ground part of the plant is a "false stem" or pseudostem, consisting of leaves and their fused bases. Each pseudostem can produce a single flowering stem. After fruiting, the pseudostem dies, but offshoots may develop from the base of the plant. Cultivars of banana are usually sterile, without seeds or viable pollen. [4]
The Madagascar banana tree is a herbaceous tree. [4] It loses all of its leaves in the dry season with only a pseudostem of leaf-sheaths remaining. [5]A typical Madagascar banana tree is 5 to 6 meters high, with a trunk swollen at the base into a thick tuber 2.5 m in circumference.