ourable conditions, producing its first bunch in from ten to
twelve months after planting. At the same time that it is producing its
first bunch it will send up two or more suckers at the base of the
parent plant, and these in turn will bear fruit, and so on. After
bearing, the stalk that has produced the bunch of fruit is cut down; if
this is not done it will die down, as its work has been completed, and
other suckers take its place. Too many suckers should not be allowed to
grow or the plants will become too crowded, and be consequently stunted
and produce small bunches. All the cultivation that is necessary is the
keeping down of weed growth, and this, once the plants occupy the whole
of the land, is not a hard matter. A plantation is at its best when
about three years old, but remains profitable for six years or longer;
in fact, there are many plantations still bearing good fruit that have
been planted from twelve to twenty years. Small-growing or dwarf kinds,
such as the Cavendish variety, are planted at from 12 to 16 feet apart
each way, but large-growing bananas, such as the Sugar and Lady's
Finger, require from 20 to 25 feet apart each way, as do the
stronger-growing varieties of plantain. Plantains are not grown to any
extent in Queensland, and our principal varieties are those already
mentioned, the Cavendish variety greatly predominating. In the North,
the cultivation of this latter variety is carried out on an extensive
scale, principally by Chinese gardeners, who send the bulk of their
produce to the Southern States of the Commonwealth. The industry
supports a large number of persons other than the actual producers of
the fruit, and forms one of our principal articles of export from the
North. As many as 20,000 or more large bunches of bananas frequently
leave by a single steamer for the South, and the bringing of this
quantity to the port of shipment gives employment to a number of men on
tram lines and small coastal steamers. The shipment of a heavy cargo of
bananas presents a very busy scene that is not soon forgotten, the
thousands of bunches of fruit that are either piled up on the wharf or
that are being unloaded from railway trucks, small steamers or sometimes
Chinese junks, forming such a mass of fruit that one often wonders how
it is possible to consume it all before it becomes over-ripe. Still, it
is consumed, or, at any rate, the greater portion of it is, as it is the
universal fruit of the less we