In the first years after the coconuts are transplanted, it is good policy to raise catch-crops between the trees. But these crops should be so chosen that they will not compete with the coconut for light or water; and from the profit they pay, a return should be made to the soil of fertilizers at least sufficient to replace what they have removed. By the time the grove is four years old, the coconuts will shade the ground and it will no longer be possible to raise catch-crops on a large scale. Then, but not before this time, it is good practice to use the grove for pasture. The returns from live-stock should be at least sufficient to pay for keeping the plantation in good condition and cattle will themselves do a large part of the work in keeping down the other vegetation. Pasturing of other live-stock in coconut groves is in general not to be recommended. It is not customary anywhere in the tropics to give to coconut plantations such cultivation as is given to orchards in temperate countries. It has ever been believed that any but the most shallow cultivation would be detrimental by destroying the roots near the surface, and that machine-cultivation was likely to be top expensive to be profitable, in view of the time that it would have to be kept up before the coconut begins to pay returns. Limited experience in the Philippines indicates that real cultivation produces very much the same results with coconuts as it does with other crops. Coconuts respond, as do other crops, to the application of manures containing potash, nitrogen, and phosphorus. So far as the very limited evidence shows, the demand for these three fertilizing elements is in the order given. With ordinarily good treatment, coconuts come into bearing in seven or eight years. Single trees of standard varieties will bear fruit in five years, while others will require ten. If the coconut is treated as a wild crop, which is by no means uncommon, and little or no attention is given it after the first three years, it will be ten or fifteen years, as a rule, before a full crop is produced and even then the crop will be an inferior one.
The coconut makes on the climate the characteristic demands of a typically tropical plant. It thrives where the mean annual temperature is 72° F. or higher, and where there are no great differences in temperature between seasons. Except where supply of ground water makes it independent of local rainfall, the coconut demands an annual rainfall of at least one meter (about 40 in.); and this precipitation should be well distributed through the year. In most of the best coconut countries, the rainfall is considerably more than one meter. The coconut can endure exceedingly drying conditions for short periods, and is accordingly adapted to the intense light of the seashore, to resisting strong winds, and to enduring salt water about its roots for short periods of time. Moreover, it will live through prolonged droughts. But long dry seasons cut down the crops; and the damage done by droughts lasts for as much as two or three years after the return of rain. A dry season of five or six months every other year will keep the crop at all times down to not more than 40 per cent of what it would be if the supply of water were constant. If there is an ample supply of soil-water, dryness of the atmosphere is favorable to the best production. Seacoasts usually have higher land back of them, and the ground-water from the higher country circulates through the soil toward the sea. Near the shore it comes near enough to the surface to be reached by the roots of the coconut. For this reason, coconuts thrive on the seashore under climatic conditions that prevent good development in the interior. This is the principal ground for the idea that coconuts thrive only near the sea. Around the bases of volcanoes in the interior, similar soil conditions are met with, and such localities are admirably adapted to this crop.
CH
The above text is from the Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture. It may be out of date, but still contains valuable and interesting information which can be incorporated into the remainder of the article. Click on "Collapse" in the header to hide this text.
|