How Do You Desucker Banana Plants?
Banana plants can spread quickly through suckers, which are new plants that grow off of a horizontal root from the mother plant. In order to produce a healthy bunch of fruit, however, you need only three shoots, including the mother plant. Any other suckers will detract from the fruit and must be removed. Desuckering is not a difficult process as long as you know how to handle the banana plant and remove the sucker so that it will not return. Evaluate your banana plants to decide which sucks you will remove. You must keep the mother plant and the two suckers that immediately followed the mother plant. The other suckers should be removed. The three specimens should be staggered in growth: the mother full-grown, the following sucker not yet mature, and the last sucker only a baby plant. Cut the excess suckers level to the ground with pruning shears. Clean your pruning shears with rubbing alcohol before and after use to prevent the spread of disease between your plants. Scoop out a small
