Bananas sprout in Rayleigh Garden UK after 15 years

Seems like an opportunity to plug the latest video by my favorite YouTube long form documentary maker, OTR:

The History of the Banana

https://youtu.be/YVVD1cYelUE?is=ADLXFR_-mIMdDfom

Here gets into ancient innovations that allowed bananas to be grown outside of their native habitat in Papua New Guinea.

If you haven't seen his content, and you get sucked in, then settle in without distractions - this is the opposite end of spectrum of TikTok, etc. Also, don't watch his "History of Sugar" documentary if you are feeling depressed. Instead watch the "History of Curry".

> He pointed out that Musa Basjoos are not really for eating.

> He said: "It's basically like having a mouth full of ball bearings with half a teaspoon of banana on them."

Maybe we can iterate on the texture some more here.

The UK straddles the 55th parallel North. Due to the jet streams (and formerly, trade winds) carrying warm air from the Caribbean, it has often benefitted from a milder climate than other regions at similar latitudes: Alaska, Siberia, the Baltic states.

But this is wild. I am only in my 40s but I've seen the climate change significantly and it having a major impact on flora and fauna.

When I was a kid, English wine was a joke and now it's winning prizes because we have the same climate French vineyards did when I was a child. The idea of growing olives in the UK was laughable, but now in the South East of England it's starting to look commercially viable. Only 10 years ago I remember days with highs over 30C being rare, but we just had two weeks of them, accompanied by tropical nights (not dropping below 20C), for the first time I remember.

And now... bananas. Which is, pun intended, utterly bananas.

It feels too late to stop the worst of the damage, but the idea of this accelerating and getting worse is just astonishing to me, that within my lifetime I'd witness such a huge swing in climatology.

Last year ours bloomed, too. The problem is that it happens to late in the year and I can’t wrap that 5m high “tree” to protect from the cold. So the bananas were the size of your pinky. Next problem, once they bloom, they die. So yes, climate change is real. For comparison, we are located in south Germany near Stuttgart and we also have a fig tree and an olive tree in our garden.

I have a paw paw tree that has survived 7 years in northern Wisconsin. Unfortunately it is the only one out of five that I planted that has survived and so I'll never get fruit because they reproduce sexually and as far as I know the closest one is 4 hours south in Madison.

In South America there's a very aggressive spider that lives on the bananas (genus Phoneutria). Spiders usually shy away from humans but these attack and have a very nasty venom. I wonder if the heat will take nasty critters to Europe.

With these heatwaves, many cities in France, Italy and England are at times *hotter* than cities in the tropical SEA! No wonder the bananas are starting to fruit.

There were hippo bones found under Trafalgar Square, and once-upon-a-time (10kya) elephants, lions, and rhinos were once endedmic to Britain

It looks like Javanese call that banana as Gedhang Kluthuk (Stone Banana, direct translation). The owner can use it to make a super delicious Rujak Cingur.

I saw a banana tree with green bananas in Fribourg Switzerland in September 2025. According to Gemini this city is much colder than Essex, and yet.

I have several banana plants in my garden in Southern England. Musa Sikkimensis and Musa Basjoo, 3+m tall at the moment.

Winters are too cold for them here. So either you heavily mulch them and they start from the roots every spring while the stems die in winter. Or you learn how to wrap the stems to protect them over winter.

It might be possible, or borderline to keep them unprotected within London but outside of there and inland temperatures can drop below -5C even in the South.

On the other hand, I think they have started growing tropical fruits like mangos and bananas in Sicily.

... Botanist James Wong has appeared on the BBC's A Countryside Summer

Wong, 45, has presented for BBC series' Grow Your Own Drugs and Secrets of Your Food.

Curious what is the latest on genetic improvement of banana against Panama disease ?

Um. I wonder if there are any export opportunities for British Bananas ?

Lovely

Slightly off-topic:

When I used to eat banana-flavored things (milkshakes, chocolate bars, etc), I always thought that the flavor was artifically inflated and tasted nothing like an actual banana...

...until I went to Fiji. Externally, the appearance of the banana would probably render it as waste in Western countries as it doesn't look nice and yellow - and looks close to what an overripe/rotten banana looks like, but gosh they tasted amazing!

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> ...while we say goodbye to some old favourites.

An incredibly dystopian way to minimise human-caused climate change and potential extinction for yet more species.