It is only in the last few years that Coprah has acquired importance as an article of export. There are large cocoanut plantations on all the principal islands, whence supplies are furnished to meet the foreign demand, which is likely to increase considerably.
For figures of Coprah Shipments, vide Chap. [xxxi]., “Trade Statistics.”
Uses are also found for the hard Shell of the nut (Tagálog, Baoo). In native dwellings these shells serve the poor for cups (tabo ) and a variety of other useful domestic utensils, whilst by all classes they are converted into ladles with wooden handles. Also, when carbonized, the shell gives a black, used for dyeing straw hats.
Very little use is made of the Coir (Tagálog, Bunot), or outer fibrous skin, which in other countries serves for the manufacture of cocoanut matting, coarse brushes, hawsers, etc. It is said that coir rots in fresh water, whereas salt water strengthens it. It would therefore be unsuitable for running rigging, but for shipsʼ cables it cannot be surpassed in its qualities of lightness and elasticity. As it floats on water, it ought to be of great value on ships, whilst of late years its employment in the manufacture of light ocean telegraph cables has been seriously considered, showing, as it does, an advantage over other materials by taking a convex curve to the water surface—an important condition in cable-laying.[5] The Spaniards call this product Banote. In this Colony it often serves for cleaning floors and shipsʼ decks, when the nut is cut into two equal parts across the grain of the coir covering, and with it a very high polish can be put on to hardwoods.
The stem of the Cocoanut Palm is attacked by a very large beetle with a single horn at the top of its head. It bores through the bark and slightly injures the tree, but I never heard that any had died in consequence. In some countries this insect is described as the rhinoceros beetle, and is said to belong to the Dynastidæ species.
In the Philippines, the poorest soil seems to give nourishment to the cocoanut-palm; indeed, it thrives best on, or near, the sea-shore, as close to the sea as where the beach is fringed by the surf at high tide. The common cocoanut-palm attains a height of about sixty feet, but there is also a dwarf palm with the stem sometimes no taller than four feet at full growth, which also bears fruit, although less plentifully. A grove of these is a pretty sight.
Sir Emerson Tennent, referring to these trees in Ceylon, is reported to have stated[6] that the cocoanut-palm “acts as a conductor in protecting houses from lightning. As many as 500 of these trees were struck in a single pattoo near Pattalam during a succession of thunderstorms in April 1859.”—Colombo Observer.
Nipa Palm (Nipa fruticans) is found in mangrove swamps and flooded marshy lands. It has the appearance of a gigantic fern, and thrives best in those lands which are covered by the sea at high tide. In the same manner as the cocoanut-palm, the sap is extracted by incision made in the fruit-bearing stalk, and is used for distilling a liquid known as nipa wine, which, however, should properly be termed a spirit. The leaves, which are very long, and about three to five inches wide, are of immense value in the country for thatched roofs. Nipa is not to be found everywhere; one may go many miles without seeing it, in districts devoid of marshes and swampy lowlands. In El Abra district (Luzon Is.) nipa is said to be unknown. In such places, another material supplies its want for thatching, viz.:—
Cogon (Saccharum koenigii), a sort of tall jungle grass with a very sharp edge, plentifully abundant precisely where nipa cannot be expected to grow. I have ridden through cogon five feet high, but a fair average would be about three to four feet. It has simply to be cut and sun-dried and is ready for roof thatching.
The Cotton-tree (Gossypium herbaceum, Linn. ?), (Tagálog, Bulac), is found growing in an uncultivated state in many islands of the Archipelago. Long-staple cotton was formerly extensively cultivated in the Province of Ilocos Norte, whence, many years ago, large quantities of good cotton-stuffs were exported. This industry still exists. The cultivation of this staple was, however, discouraged by the local governors, in order to urge the planting of tobacco for the Government supplies. It has since become difficult to revive the cotton production, although an essay, in pamphlet form (for which a prize was awarded in Madrid), was gratuitously distributed over the Colony in 1888 with that object. Nevertheless, cotton spinning and weaving are still carried on, on a reduced scale, in the Ilocos provinces (Luzon west coast).