spider mites...look very closely. They are nasty little devilish creatures who make nice plants look bad. Take them outside and spray them good..keep them wet/humid.

Its normal for the lower leaves to dye off, once it turns yellow it is fine to just take some CLEAN scissors or a clean knife to cut it off about an inch or two from the main stem of plant. Any more questions feel free to send me a message I have lots of banana's. They grow fine as a container plant but require lots of water & very well drained soil.

Thanks for the disease pictures link tropicallawyer. I am a novice banana grower and just have 2 small plants. Both have brown patches on the leaves. I didn't think they looked diseased, but have been searching on the internet for a while, to try to find the cause/disease. And was getting worried, seeing things like black leaf streak etc. Then I saw a picture and description, in your link, that was a perfect match - "Figure 4. On some varieties such as Cavendish types, leaves of young banana suckers naturally have maroon- colored blotches (above) that should not be mistaken for symptoms of black leaf streak disease. These blotches are naturally occurring on young plants and are not present on leaves of older plants" What a relief !

Wolfridgeil - I too thought it odd that the damage started primarily at the leaf tip. My suspicions right now are either the Spotted Tentiform Leafminer or the Apple Leafminer, but I'm still not sure I have a positive ID. The damaged leaves visible in the second link you provided look very similar to the leaves on my trees, although the larvae were much, much smaller than the caterpillar pictured. In an effort to rid the trees of the problem, I took the time to pinch each "tent" that had formed, with the intent of killing whatever larvae resided within. Barring a second generation of the pest, this should rid my trees of the problem for this year. Interestingly, it primarily affected only two of the six apples trees. Bradybb - If you have fruit trees that are displaying similar symptoms, be sure that small "tents" aren't forming on the leaves. If they are, I encourage you to open one up to see what you find.