I have a small banana tree that a friend gave me this fall. I have never owned a banana tree and do not know how to care for it. The tree has always been indoors and I don’t know what my friend did with the tree during the winter but I can’t ask her because she is very ill now and I don’t wan to worry her with the tree. About three weeks about the tree started to look sad, some of the leaves let themselves down and I cut them, other leaves had brown spots and yellow around them and I trimmed the bad spots. I also put worm fertilizer on the tree and sprayed the tree with a mist of water frequently to make it feel like in the tropics but apparently none of these worked. I decided then to repot the tree to a bigger container that stressed the tree even further. Now the trunk is very saggy and I wonder if I should cut it to the ground like a lot of people do with their outside trees, the difference here is that my tree has always been indoor and I wonder if the tree is dying instead of going into hibernation stage. What should I do? What is happening to my tree?
Sounds like it is rotting away, the current situation apparently having unsuitable conditions. Should be in a warm, bright and humid location for best results.
Normally, I'd say it's going dormant which is totally normal for an indoor banana in Massechussets in the wintertime. Ideally, you should cut off all of the leaves, then place it in a cool, dry place and water about once a month. You should never fertilize a banana plant in the wintertime. HOWEVER. Before you do anything for it, you need to check and see if the pseudostem (the "trunk") is at all squishy, and do the same for the rhizome. If you've got squishiness, Ron B is right and it's rotting. Ideally, only the pseudostem would be mooshy, and you could cut it off below the mooshy part, let the pot dry out, and put it in a cool, dark place until spring. If it's only wilting, by all means cut it back to just above the soil level.
Lorax and Ron B. The rhizome is not squishy, only the pseudostem. You just confirmed to me that cutting it is what I am supposed to do. Thanks, Bananatree.
