The Cocoanut: With reference to its products and cultivation in the Philippines

by William Scrugham Lyon

The thick, fleshy roots of the newly upturned palm are loaded with water, and tell us that an inexhaustible store of this fluid is an indispensable element of success. If further evidence of this were required, the testimony of drooping leaves and of crops shrunken from one-half to two-thirds, throughout the cocoanut districts and upon our own orchard in Mindanao, as the result of drought, confirm it and bespeak the necessity of copious water at all times.

The living tree upon the sea sands further emphasizes this necessity; for, while its roots are lapped by the tides, it never flags or wilts, and from this we may gather the added value of a site which can be irrigated. The careful observer will note that along miles of sea beach, among hundreds of trees whose roots are either in actual contact with the incoming waves, or subjected to the subterranean influence of the sea, there will never be so much as one tree growing in any beach basin which collects and holds tidal water for even a brief time; and that, notwithstanding the large number of nuts that must have found lodgment and favorable germinating influence in such places, none succeed in growing. From this we may derive the assurance that the desired water must be in motion and that land near stagnant water, or marsh land, is unsuitable to the plant.

It may frequently be observed that trees will be found growing fairly thriftily upon mounds or hummocks, in places invaded by flood or other waters which, by reason of backing or damming up, have become stagnant. An examination of the roots of an overthrown tree in such a locality will show that all of those in the submerged zone have perished and rotted away, but that such is the vitality and recuperative energy of the tree that it has thrown out a new feeding system in the dryer soil of the mound immediately surrounding the stem, which has been sufficient to successfully carry on the functions of nutrition, but altogether ineffective to anchor the tree securely, or to prevent its prostration before the first heavy gale.

While this phase of the question will receive more attention when we come to consider the chemistry of suitable manures, it may be said that, although analysis of the cocoanut ash derived from beach-grown nuts shows a larger percentage of those salts that abound in sea water than those grown inland, yet the equal vigor, vitality, and fruitfulness of the latter simply confirm the plant’s exceptional adaptability to environment and ability to take up and decompose, without detriment, the salts of sea or brackish waters. As a victim to the maritime idea, the writer in 1886 planted, far inland, several hundred nuts in beds especially devised to reproduce littoral conditions; shore gravel, sea sand, broken shells, and salt derived from sea water being used in preparing the seed beds. The starting growth was unexcelled. Then came a long period of yellowing decline and almost suspended animation, ultimately followed by a complete restoration to health and vigor. The early excellent growth was due to the fact that the first nourishment of the plant is entirely derived from the endosperm, and careful lifting of the young plants disclosed the fact that recovery from their moribund condition was, in every instance, coincident with the time that the roots first succeeded in working through the unpalatable mess about them into the outlying good, sweet soil.

The exposure of the plantation is an important consideration, and a maritime site should be selected in preference to one far inland, unless it be on an open, unprotected flat, exposed to the influence of every breeze or the fiercest gales that blow.

The structure of the cocoanut seems well fitted to endure winds of almost any force, and that a remarkably abundant and strong circulation of air is essential to its best development is well shown by comparing a tree subjected to it with the wretched, spindling specimen growing in a sheltered glen or ravine.

Strong confirmation of this may be found within the artificial environment of a plant conservatory, where it is feasible to reproduce, in the minute detail of soil, water, temperature, and humidity, every essential to its welfare except a good, strong breeze. As a consequence, the palm languishes and it has long been deemed, on this account, one of the most rebellious subjects introduced into palm-house cultivation.

The Soil.

The soils for cocoanut growing are best selected by the process of exclusion. The study of the root development of the palm will prove to be an unerring guide to proper soil selection.