Description |
Plant tillering freely, sending up suckers at long distances
from the parent stem and forming only lax open stools. Pseudostems slender, 1 - 2
metres high, green, devoid of any perceptible wax bloom. Leaf blades up to about 1
metre 50 long and 40 cm. wide, medium dark green above, scarcely paler beneath, truncate
at apex, narrowing rather gradually to an acute base and finally decurrent as moderately
prominent petiole margins, which closely clasp the pseudostem at base and early become
scarious at the region of junction ; midrib flushed red on the lower surface ; petioles 40
- 50 cm. long. Inflorescence quite erect ; peduncle velvety
with a dense minute puberulence ; first sterile bract usually a foliage leaf with a
broadened petiole developing red colour, this followed by one sterile true bract 20 - 30
cm. long. Flowers of the basal bracts female, usually about 4 "hands" of
4 - 6 flowers each. Female flowers 7 - 8 cm. long overall, the perianth about as long as the ovary,
free tepal ¼ to 1/3 as long as the compound tepal, the latter yellow, its lobes
little darker in colour than the rest.
Male
bud in advanced blooming ovate, the bracts slightly imbricate at the tip. Bracts
bright brick-red, much the same colour within as without, slightly glaucous on the outside
and rather strongly sulcate, without wax on the inside and transversely corrugated between
the ridges.
Male flowers about 6 - 10 per bract in two rows ; compound tepal about 4 cm. long, 1.8 cm.
wide, orange-yellow, its tip and lobes slightly darker, the lateral lobes 5 mm. long, with
a minute dorsal appendage ; tree tepal scarcely more than 1 cm long, boat shaped,
orbicular if flattened out, with a small apicula ; stamens as long as the compound tepal,
the filaments a little longer than the anthers.
Fruit bunch very compact, the fruits almost appressed to the rachis. Individual
fruits about 8 - 10 cm. long, 2 cm. in diameter (fresh), on a very short pedicel and with
a short (0.5 cm.) but pronounced acumen ; ripening yellow and remaining strongly angled at
full ripeness.
Seeds dull black, irregularly depressed-globose, smooth, 6 - 7 mm. across and 3 mm. high.
(Cheesman 1949 k). |
Comments |
The name "laterita" was given to the
species on account of its brick-red bracts, the colour of the tropical soil
laterite.
Cheesman notes that the plant has a strong general resemblance to Musa ornata
but, while it hybridises with it, it does not show a strong genetic affinity with that
species and in other respects it approaches the section Eumusa species more
closely than any other Rhodochlamys. The ability of the plant to hybridise
with Musa ornata suggests one possible origin of some of the plants commonly but
sometimes erroneously known in tropical horticulture as cultivars of Musa ornata.
However the plants known in the horticultural trade as Musa ornata 'Bronze' and Musa
ornata 'Red Salmon' are more or less pure Musa laterita.Simmonds
1962 opines that "(the mysterious) Musa rubra [ ] is
allied to (and may even be identical with) M. laterita." The
illustration of Musa rubra in Curtis's Botanical Magazine of 1895 shows it to be
remarkably similar to Musa laterita.
The
vegetative plant suckers freely but, unlike most Musa, the suckers are borne at
the end of long rhizomes. So instead of the typical clumped appearance
of most bananas, Musa laterita has a rather open habit. In a greenhouse bed
or in a garden in the tropics Musa laterita is a rather unruly plant that soon
"travels" from its planting place. Fortunately the plant is quite
amenable to pot culture where the long rhizomes will not be apparent until the plant is
re-potted.
Chromosome number n = 11.
Images:
There are 10
images of Musa laterita including a
sequence of photographs of Musa laterita grown as a flowering pot plant by Markku Häkkinen in Finland. |