Make Fruits From The Musaceae Family (Bananas)

       "Musaceae is a family of flowering plants composed of three genera with about 91 known species, placed in the order Zingiberales. The family is native to the tropics of Africa and Asia. The plants have a large herbaceous growth habit with leaves with overlapping basal sheaths that form a pseudostem making some members appear to be woody trees. In most treatments, the family has three genera, Musa, Musella and Ensete. Cultivated bananas are commercially important members of the family, and many others are grown as ornamental plants." Read more . . .

Left, apple-bananas. Center, red bananas. Right, Lady finger bananas all sculpted from oven-backe
clay and then painted using acrylic paints.

Cavendish bananas are most commonly
purchased in the United States.

 

       "The cultivated banana is doubtless the most important and most widely grown of all tropical fruits. It is a conspicuous example of a cultivated plant which has definitely lost its ability to produce seed and must be propagated by shoots from its underground stem. It was originally a native of the tropics. There are two main types, the common banana and the dwarf Chinese or Cavendish banana, each with numerous varieties, especially the former. The variety generally grown in Central America and the West Indies for the U. S. market is known as Gros-Michel." Dahlgren

More About Bananas:

• Banana poems and characters