The wonderful plum tree outside my house was not able to withstand the storm last night and snapped about ten feet from the ground, sending the branches (with a zillion plums) into a stream. I got up at half past five this morning and rescued as many branches as I could. (Chainsaws, slippery steps and water are not particularly good bedfellows). I now have half a zillion plums which are the right colour but still a bit crunchy. Another month and they would have been fine.
I visited my dad recently who put a mouldy banana in his greenhouse. He says this gives off ethelene which will encourage his tomatoes to ripen. Would this have the same effect on my plums? Any other suggestions to encourage them to ripen before they go the same way as my dad's banana?

Your Dad's correct and it must be worth a try in order to salvage the plums, the other thing would be to jam them and add sugar..perhaps

Sorry to hear about your tree, what a blow espcially when it was nearly ready to fruit! Perhaps you could try putting some on newspaper on a sunny windowsill and see if they ripen indoors like my green toms did that I had to remove off blighted toms.

I guess you could make chutney with underripe fruit but I wouldn't try making jam.

Plums can ripen off the tree, I harvest mine early before the birds and wasps do too much damage.