Preparing for the Summer

The first harvest of fruit is coming in about 1 month, I now have 72 bunches formed.

Hooray!!! My first bunch has formed on a Gran Nain.

Over the past two weeks I've planted 94 plants in tow rows in my field. It is really hot so everything is growing quickly.

More planting

Busy week so far...I have planted 50 more bananas out in the field with the help of my wonderful wife. The herbicide application really helped clear the weeds and I think this might be the best looking planting for some time to come. I'm going to Anaheim this week to drum up some business and spend some time with my wife, but when I get back it will be time for some more planting to finish the year out. Dry season is upon us and I am hoping that actually have that wet el-nino winter that is predicted.

Weekend of weed control

Well, I mowed between the rows on Saturday until the rain chased me out and then I went back out today to do some chemical weed control to get ready for planting. I have about 180 plants that will need to be planted over the next month or so and I have decided to go with a stale planting approach. The weeds have come up and now I will kill them. I also am trying to control the undergrowth around the bananas that are already 4+' tall. I could not finish today's task because I ran out of water and there was a storm approaching. Maybe, just maybe I'll finish this week.

First Post

NK Lago Farms, LLC is a small farm in Canal Point, Florida that currently grows bananas on about 5 Acres of land. The business is owned by my wife, Kiley Harper-Larsen and operated by me ,Nicholas Larsen and began growing in January, 2009. The genesis of the enterprise started in our backyard. I am a hobby gardener and an agronomist by trade. I was amazed at how easy it was to produce large quantities of bananas with very little input in our backyard. I did the math and realized that a profit was possible if done on a commercial scale. I started doing background research to try to learn what the best varieties were and what was needed as far as equipment and fertilizer. I told a farmer friend about my plan and he agreed to let me farm 5 acres of his for percent of the returns. I started hunting down tissue culture bananas to start my farm with and 9 months into the venture I have about some variety on my farm. Most of the farm is planted to Dwarf Namwah. I also have some Gran Nain, some Misi Luki, and a cooking banana Kandrian. It's been a lot of work digging all the holes and planting all the plants, unlike most agriculture in the Everglades, bananas are only minimally mechanized.