Of banana trees and Christmas

Writer: Rev Tim Attwell, Betty’s Bay

Forty odd years ago I knew nothing about bananas. Moving into a new home in Amanzimtoti I was thrilled to find young banana trees in the garden.

They produced splendid purple flowers at the top of their stems and magnificent bunches of delicious bananas. We had bananas for breakfast, lunch and supper, baked banana bread, gave bananas away… we went, well, bananas.

Then, horrors! The banana trees began to lean over and wilt. I propped them up with wooden poles, weeded all around them, watered them, treated them with fungicide. I pleaded with them not to die. But they died anyway. Devastated, I asked an agricultural friend: “How do I stop my banana trees dying?”

“Cut them down.” “What!” “While they are dying, new shoots come up at the base, then you chop the old trees down.”

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