Notes on wild species of Musa from Sumatra

Our knowledge of the wild banana species occurring in Sumatra is still very scanty. Most herbarium collections are imcomplete, and but few botanist have paid attention to them in the field. The earlier records, field observations and collections were made by the Italian botanist Beccari about eighty years ago. He described one of his findings as Musa sumatrana; this species was hitherto known only from the type collection. I could study the type locality of this banana, the waterfall in the Anei canyon (called Air Mantjur in Minangkebau language), West Sumatra. It grows there together with two other wild banana species which were also found by me in other parts of West Sumatra. One of them appeared to be new to science.