The dates, green at first, later in the year a yellowish brown, are, when ripe, amber or black in color.
The trees require a very dry, hot climate, but moist soil. Long, long ago, this saying was common among the Arabs, "The date palm, the queen of trees, must have her feet in running water and her head in the burning sky."
Although there are lovely date palm trees on the grounds of many California homes, few of them bear fruit. The temperature must average from eighty to ninety degrees for a considerable time in the summer, in order to mature it. What is the average summer temperature in your locality?
If an ordinary tree is frost-bitten, it recovers and soon puts out a new growth; but if the crown of the date palm be frozen, the tree dies.
When the Moors went to Spain, in the eleventh century, they introduced this valuable tree which the mission fathers several hundred years later brought to Mexico and to Southern California.
How would you like to try to climb a date palm tree? Although they look so smooth and are without branches, the natives of the desert climb them without any help whatever. The trunk is always somewhat rough, and this makes it possible to ascend them.
Fig. 55.—Date Palm Trees.
Not all of the dates in a bunch ripen at once, so they are usually picked by hand and only the ripe ones selected. Sometimes, however, the bunches are cut off. Some dates contain so much sap that the bunches must be hung up to allow it to drain off before they can be shipped. This sap is called date honey, and is saved. They are sent to the coast towns in bags or boxes called frails. Where dates are to be sold in small quantities, they are repacked in the small boxes such as you have seen.