Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii History

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Dave Brown
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Dave Brown »

As far as I am aware 'Montbeliardii''s were never introduced into the UK until David Constantine introduced them in 2007. One was documented in California in 1930s.

None of these are 'developed' they are bred by Ethiopian Farmers, so when it was lost to western plant growers it would have just been a case of identifying where it was in use in Ethiopia. Maybe not an easy task

Not every plant is capable of being TC'd and as there are so few around people are less likely to give them up for TC experimenting
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SteveW

Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by SteveW »

I have no idea how much it costs to tissue culture a plant,but would hazard a guess at it being a fair bit. So you would have to sell an awful lot of plants to cover costs. Hence jungleseeds selling them for £30 a pop.
Dave,the hinibas are pretty much ready now for pickup. It's just the posting out I can't find time to do yet. Doing a lot of home Renovations etc. so finding tome to sort out suitable packaging for them isn't that high up on my list of priorites right now.
The other problem I have is the price. I spent a lot of money buying a biogreen heatmat and growlight last autumn to ensure I got as many plants through winter as I could. I potentially had 60+ plants that if I'd have had a little more time before separating would have got more through. As it is I managed to get 25 hinibas and 1 'Montbeliardii'. So bearing in mind I probably spent £150 (not including the cost of electricity :shock: ) getting them to the state they're at now,how much would you charge for them?
Answers on a postcard please :lol:
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Yorkshire Kris »

I understand that it would cost a lot to set up tissue culturing and be a sizeable investment for a company but somebody has took this gamble with Tandarra red so my not a 'Montbeliardii'? A 'Montbeliardii' is far more distinct and garden-worthy compared to some other nanas IMHO so hopefully someone will have a go and get this into mass production (if at all possible?).
CW01

Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by CW01 »

Great thread Dave thought i would share a couple of pics of my 4 year old excuse the mess in the background :)
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25-03-11.jpg
25-03-2011.jpg
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by CW01 »

I would be very interested in a 'Hiniba' Steve looks a great plant
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Dave Brown »

Just to bring the topic up to date as the last pics were in March and a lot has happened since then.

'Montbeliardii' has been outside apart from 2 nights in early March when we had temps down to -3.7C. That was pushing it a bit, so 'Montbeliardii' was man handled into the conservatory. The last air frost was on 8th March, and after hardening off it was moved up the garden to where it was going to be planted.

Last year as it was at the back of the border and everything else grow to 3 or 4 feet, we could not see 'Montbeliardii' in his full glory, so this year I decided to plant where the trunk would also be visible. Also by the east boundary it was trashed by the wind so I was looking for a more sheltered place..... a pretty tall order at the 'Windiest Place on Earth' :lol:

Here acclimatising to it's new home 15th April before planting out.
2011-04-15 18-31-46 Monty.jpg
Then on Good Friday I decided to plant out. :wink: I had allowed myself about an hour to plant out, but due the modeling clay soil, which had to be removed as well beyond being improved, it actually took nearly 3 hours :ahhh!: 10 bags of modeling clay were dug out and made ready to go to the recycling centre.
2011-04-22 17-25-34 Monty planting hole.jpg
The bottom of the hole was broken up to allow drainage, and a mixture of garden compost and MP compost prepared and incorperated into the hole. 'Montbeliardii' was then added to the middle
2011-04-22 18-14-46 Monty planting.jpg
As the planting site is in the middle of a chipped area I need a demarkation between the chippings and the organic material loved by Ensete. For this I used log roll removed from the lower part of the garden last year.
2011-04-22 18-36-44 Monty planting.jpg
I had to be careful to make as round as possible, and eventually to bang in level, which took quite a while, but eventually at dusk the job was done :wink:
2011-04-22 19-16-52 Monty planting.jpg
All went well until May Bank Holiday when true to form the Easterly Howlers started. These dry, sunny winds cause more damage than Atlantic gales, as they shred then desicate the leaves :roll:
2011-05-03 17-45-18 Monty wind battered.jpg
Well, that brings us up to date so far. :wink:
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mushtaq86

Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by mushtaq86 »

Dave what is the diameter of the hole and how deep is it.
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Dave Brown »

About 2 1/2 feet wide and 15 inches deep.
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sanatic1234

Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by sanatic1234 »

Nice one dave. :) 'Montbeliardii' looks like it fits that place well. Hopefully these winds won't last all summer!
Ian Cooke

Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Ian Cooke »

Dave Brown wrote:As far as I am aware 'Montbeliardii''s were never introduced into the UK until David Constantine introduced them in 2007. One was documented in California in 1930s.
I happen to have an old 2003 catalogue from KobaKoba and also once heard David Constantine speak. It would seem that 'Montbeliardii' was a new introduction for Constantine and he chose to use the established name believing it to be 'a fair match' for the original. His text in the catalogue which is extensive, does not say where the recent introduction came from but my hazy memory of his talk, years ago, suggests that he or someone else had repeated the original cross that produced 'Montbeliardii'. He speaks of it as the 'non-identical twin of 'Maurelii' but just speaks of it being 'discovered'.

I have attached the extract from the catalogue if anyone wants to read it. The catalogue is a detailed and wonderful reference on bananas and other exotics. I'd forgotten I had it until I read this thread!
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Dave Brown »

Hi Ian, Thanks for the info on that. icon_thumright

Having scoured the web during the winter months for info on Ensete, virtually all information is around Enset cultivation as an Ethiopian food crop not adversly affected if the summer rains fail, unlike all grain crops.

The information is all University studies, and it appears that there are over 70 cultivars/ landraces all based on Ensete ventricosum. In one of the studies they were looking at frost tolerance and growth rates at different altitudes. This interested me as that is what we are also looking for. The landrace described as having the best forst tolerance talks of a tall slender plant, with upright leaves, to about 7m. They also went onto say that the darker the leaves the more frost resistance it had, but the trade off was that the dark colour gave a more bitter taste.

This plant, to me, sounds exactly like E.v Montbeliardii the first time around, and this time. The fact they are landraces means they are local types, so we might expect very similar, but not identical, plants to immerge

Another study covered Enset husbandry, and it talked of farmers joy at having a wild Ensete appear in their farm, and they allowed some selected cultivated Enset to reach flowering size (not cropping) to give new blood into their Enset portfolio. Obviously this is a very long drawn out process with Ensete taking between 5 and 15 years to flower depending on altitude.

If David Constantine did carry out the same process, I'm not surprised it took from 1957 to 2003 to get a similar plant. If it were me, I would ask for access to the Ethiopian food agency to find all the universities conducting Enset studies, then ask them to inform me of where the landrace I was looking for, was being grown :wink:

I was going to do a huge write up of what I found, but never actually got the time. I will move the last couple of posts to a new topic. Not quite sure what to call it at the moment, something along the lines of "Origins of Ensete ventricosum and cultivars"
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Yorkshire Kris »

Whatever happened to this David Contsantine bloke? Does no one know him to ask him about his Montys and how they appeared?

I've found the last two posts very interesting.
Ian Cooke

Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Ian Cooke »

I heard recently that David Constantine has died but I can't remember who told me. Loss of a good nursery and an immense source of knowledge.
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Dave Brown »

Oh, I didn't know that :(

I never met him, but a sad loss if he has died. One of my next questions was going to be to find out how to get in touch with him :roll:
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Re: Ensete ventricosum Montbeliardii, 'Montbeliardii' History

Post by Dave Brown »

Five weeks has passed since my last update on this, and the 'Montbeliardii' has been battered by NE, NW, SW, & Southerly gales since planting out, but is generally in a more sheltered, if you can call it that, part of the garden. The downside is that to see it completely I have to stand to the north looking south so the light is always behind 'Montbeliardii' with the shadow side facing the camera. This makes it very difficult to photograph. The only time to get a decent pic is early morning or late evening when the light is either east or west :wink:

It has grown 10 leaves now since waking up in March, and since the cooler, wetter weather commenced a couple of weeks ago it has really speeded up, with 3 leaves in the last 2 weeks. This seems to confirm what was said in Uni studies on Ethiopian Enset, that high humidity drives growth rather than high temperature. The Sunny, NE windy, April and May, with low humidity, did not produce good growth it even though watered well.

Here is 'Montbeliardii' today, at 8am with the sun from the east. I estimate it is now about 12 ft (3.5m) tall.
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2011-06-18 08-05-24 Ensete Monbeliardii.jpg
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