DIMORPHIC BRANCHES OF THE BANANA PLANT. 45 



the parent plant and draw a much larger proportion of nourishment 

 from it. 



These differences of relation are made still more obvious when it 

 is learned how the two kinds of branches originate. The broad-leaved 

 suckers come from buds around the sides of the rootstocks, near the 

 surface of the ground. The sword suckers begin their development 

 deep in the ground, underneath the parent rootstock. They have at 

 first the form of slender, subterranean shoots, that grow first in a 

 horizontal direction or even obliquely downward. They thicken into 

 a large fleshy bulb before beginning to grow much above ground. 

 (See PI. Vlf, fig. 2.) 



The sword suckers may be looked upon as true permanent branches 

 of the parent rootstock, while the broad-leaved suckers are better 

 adapted for separate propagation under natural conditions. Many of 

 the latter are put out above the surface of the ground. Some of 

 them have at first the form of small, rounded tubers, the buds remain- 

 ing entirely dormant. A banana plant that has been uprooted by the 

 wind does not die at once, but puts out from about its base a large 

 number of these potato-like tubers, which finall}' fall off and are read- 

 ily scattered, or roll down hill. The wild relatives of the banana plant 

 are natives of steep, rocky hillsides, where such a method of vege- 

 tative propagation would be distinctly advantageous. 



CULTURAL VALUE OF TWO TYPES OF OFFSHOOTS. 



Banana planters generally follow the rule of using the sword suck- 

 ers in setting out plantations, on the ground that they produce fruiting 

 plants quicker than the broad-leaved suckers. This is easy to believe, 

 in view of the larger amount of stored nourishment that is carried over 

 to the new plants by using the much thicker bulb of the sword suck- 

 ers instead of the relatively small rootstocks of the broad-leaved 

 suckers. Some planters in Costa Rica doubt Avhether the broad- 

 leaved suckers ever produce fruit of their own, and are inclined to 

 believe that fruiting does not begin until the necessary sword suckers 

 have had time to grow. In Jamaica, on the other hand, the sword 

 suckers are cut back nearly to the ground before planting and the 

 first crop comes from the growth of new suckers.*^ 



« See Stockdale, F. A., " The Question of a Banana Industry," Journal of the 

 Board of Agriculture of British Guiana, vol. 3, no. 2, 1909, p. 79. 



"The suckers which would be selected for planting [in Jamaica] are not the 

 same as those that would bo chosen in this colony [British Guiana 1, and the 

 method of treatment is totally different. Sucliers for planting purposes are 

 suckers that have not been cut back, or in other words, ' sword suckers ' — 

 as indicated by their first leaves being very narrow — which have been allowed 

 198 



