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

by William Scrugham Lyon

In temperate regions, the exigencies of climate exact that this be done with discretion and care, in order that the unduly stimulated growths may be fully ripened and matured against the approach of an inclement season. In the Tropics no such limitations exist, and the early growth of the tree may be profitably stimulated to the highest pitch. That this general treatment, as applied to young fruit trees, is specifically the one indicated in the early life of the cocoanut, may be quickly learned by him who will observe the avidity with which the fleshy roots of a young cocoanut will invade, embrace, and disintegrate a piece of stable manure.

Notwithstanding lack of chemical analysis, we may not question the fact that considerable supplies of both potash and phosphoric acid are withdrawn in the building up of leaf and stem; but these are found in sufficient quantity in soils of average quality to meet the early requirements of the plant. It is only when the fruiting age is reached that demands are made, especially upon the potash, which the planter is called upon to make good.

Good cultivation, the application of a generous supply of stimulating nitrogen during its early career, and the gradual substitution in later life of manures in which potash and phosphoric acid, particularly the former, predominate, are necessary.

How, then, may we best apply the nitrogen requirements of its early life? Undoubtedly through the application of abundant supplies of stable manures, press cakes, tankage, or of such fertilizers as furnish nitrogen in combination with the large volume of humus necessary to minister to the gross appetite of the plant under consideration. But the chances are that none of these are available, and the planter must have recourse to some of the green, nitrogen-gathering manures that are always at his command.

He must sow and plow under crops of pease, beans, or other legumes that will furnish both humus and nitrogen in excess of what they remove. Incidentally, they will draw heavily upon the potash deposits of the soil, and they must all be turned back, or, if fed, every kilo of the resulting manure must be scrupulously returned. He must pay for the cultivation of the land, for the growing of crops that he turns back as manure (and that involves further expense for their growing and plowing under), and, in addition, he must be subject to such outlay for about seven years before he can begin to realize for the time and labor expended.

But there are expedients to which the planter may have recourse which, if utilized, may return every dollar of cultural outlay. By the use of a wise rotation he can not only maintain his land in a good productive condition but realize a good biennial crop that will keep the plantation from being a financial drag. The rotation that occurs to me as most promising on the average cocoanut lands of these Islands would be, first, a green manure crop, followed by corn and legumes, succeeded by cotton, and then back to green manures.

To make the first green crop effective as a manure, both lime and potash are essential—the former to make available the nitrogen we hope to gather, and the potash in order to secure the largest and quickest growth of the pulse we are to raise for manurial purposes.

Both these elements are generally in good supply in our cocoanut lands; but, if there is uncertainty upon this point, both should be supplied, in some form. Fortunately, the former is cheap and abundant in most parts of the Archipelago, and, when well slaked, may be freely applied with benefit, at the rate of a ton or even more to the hectare.

In default of the mineral potash salts, the grower must seek unleached wood ashes, either by burning his own unused jungle land to procure them or by purchasing them from the neighbor who has such land to burn over. If located on the littoral, he will carefully collect all the seaweed that is blown in, although in our tropical waters the huge and abundant marine algæ are mostly lacking. Such as are found, however, furnish a not inconsiderable amount of potash, and, in the extremities to which planters remote from commercial centers are driven, no source is too inconsiderable to be overlooked.

The first green crop selected will be one known to be of tropical origin which, with fair soil conditions, will not fail to give a good yield. He may with safety try any of the native rank-growing beans, or cowpeas, soja, or velvet beans; or, if these are not procurable, he has at command everywhere an unstinted seed supply of Cajanus indicus, or of Clitorea ternatea, which will as well effect the desired end—to wit, a great volume of humus and a new soil supply of nitrogen. It remains for the planter to determine if the crop thus grown is to be plowed under, or if he will use it to still better advantage by partially feeding it, subject, as previously stated, to an honest return to the land of all the manure resulting therefrom.