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Comment by pygy_ | Hacker News Reader

There's no biodiversity in bananas. All Cavendish plants are sterile genetic clones.

It was the same for Gros Michel.

Edit: what more, GMO are not inherently bad.

Monsanto gave them a bad name, because of their commercial practice (terminator gene), and the catastrophic environmental consequences of glyphosate-resistant crops.

They can be used wisely. For example, did you know that the insulin diabetics use is produced by GM yeast?

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Yes, but that's not the only way bananas propagate. The fruit is how genetic variability gets introduced, but they also develop shoots from the root system, which eventually grow into trees themselves.

I believe traditionally bananas are grown as the main trunk, then 2 baby shoots at differing maturity. Once the main stem has fruited, it is removed and the next one takes over, at which point another shoot is allowed to develop.

The extra shoots that are removed can be used to start another "family" elsewhere, but has the risk of spreading disease. These days tissue culturing is used, with a much lower risk of spreading disease.

Offshoots are non-artificial clones. They are genetically identical to the main stem... It's just the same plant.

I'm impressed with the bananaknowledge here. Is there a limited amount of times you can do this?

I don't think there's a limit, as its part of the natural growth pattern of bananas. Some other species have similar habits - I believe there's an entire forest that is one plant - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pando_(tree)

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