-=> On 08-15-08 13:36, Roy Witt wrote to Mark Lewis <=-


 ML>> they don't? i wonder, then, what all those little dark spots are in
 ML>> the middle that some recipes say to trim out? ;)
 RW>> Those are seeds. I was being facetious because someone doesn't
 RW>> believe anything someone tells her.
 ML> hahaha...

 ML>> FWIW: yeah, we've grown banana trees from seed... pineapple, too...
 ML>> many say that it can't be done until we show them it can be :)

 RW>> Do they bear fruit?

 ML> it is too soon to tell ;)

 RW> Don't fruit bearing trees need to get their start from a graft
 RW> onto an established tree to bear fruit?

nope... as long as the reproductive genes in the seed are not modified
or something else causes the plant to be steril, then they will produce
fruit just like any other ;)

steril seeds can and do grow but they produce flowers that do not have
the reproductive parts needed or there is something else that's been
done to cause them to not generate seeds if they are pollinated and
develop actual fruit...

did you know that there's a law in hawaii that prevents bees from being
introduced to the land? this law is to prevent the pollination of the
pineapples so that the growers can maintain their hold on what it
produced and it cannot (hopefully) happen naturally... we've several
pinapples growing from seed that we're letting go for natural
pollination by insects in future years when they get mature enough to
flower...

we've had several banana trees, over the years, but drought and bad soil
caused them to die... now we're working with some we're growing from
seed in the hopes that they'll be more hardy to the available
conditions... of course, it takes more than one to have any "real"
pollination ;)

sadly, we've had to let our bees go to someone else who has more time to
work with them... when i came back to central NC some 15 or so years
ago, we had 40+ hives that were producing upwards of 100 pounds of honey
each season... my father developed a sever reaction to the bee's
odor/fragrance and was unable to attend to them each day and i was just
much too busy with work to even attempt to work them... after i retired,
i was still very busy with my computers stuffs that i was only able to
work them once a week or so... we lost over 500 pounds of honey, one
year, when we left the harvested honey chambers on the front deck and
the heat over the next week got to them and caused them to melt... then
there was also the mexican hornets and, of course, the honey bees that
found them and forged a way inside... the hornets were the worst of the
bunch and we were forced to spray poison on them which also
contamintated the honey :(

working bees is not just a hobby... it is a real job when you get a lot
of hives from gathering the swarms in the spring ;)

)\/(ark

... Two kids and they're not twins? How'd you get laid more than once?