Remedies.

Remedies may be described as preventive and aggressive, and, by an active campaign of precaution, many subsequent remedial applications can be avoided.

Most of the beetles attacking the palm are known to select heaps of decomposing rubbish and manure as their favorite (if not necessary) breeding places, and it is obviously of importance to break up and destroy such; nor can any better or more advantageous way of effecting this be suggested than by promptly spreading and plowing under all such accumulations as fast as they are made; or, if this be impracticable, by forking or turning over or otherwise disturbing the heaps, until convenient to dispose of them as first suggested.

A truly preventive and simple remedy, and one that I can commend as a result of close observation, is the application of a handful or two of sharp, coarse, clean sand in the axillæ of the young leaves. The native practice is to mix this with ashes, salt, or tobacco dust; but it is questionable if the efficacy of the remedy lies so much in these additions as in the purely mechanical effect of the sand, the constant attrition of which can not be other than highly objectionable to the insect while burrowing.

Of offensive remedies, probing with a stout hooked wire is the only form of warfare carried on in these Islands; but, as the channel of the borer is sometimes tortuous and deep, this is not always effective. A certain, simple, and easily applied remedy may be found in carbon bisulphid. It could be applied in the holes (which invariably trend downward) with a small metal syringe. The hole should be sealed immediately with a pinch of stiff, moist clay.

It is likely that this remedy and probing with a wire are the only successful ways of combatting the red beetle, whose grub strikes in wherever it finds a soft spot; but, for these species which attack the axils of the leaves, I have great faith in the efficacy of the “sand cure,” and no nut picker should go aloft unprovided with a small bamboo tube of dry, sifted sand, to protect the bases of recently expanded leaves.

In Selangor cocoanut trees now come under the government inspection, and planters and owners, under penalties, are compelled to destroy these pests. Mr. L. C. Brown, of Kuala Lampur, in that State, who writes intelligently on this subject,1 lays great stress on the value of clean cultivation in subduing beetles, and repeats a cultural axiom that never grows old and that will, consequently, bear reiteration here—that it is rarely anything but the neglected plantation that suffers, and that the maintenance at all times of a healthy, vigorous growth is in itself almost a guaranty of immunity from attacks of these pernicious insects.

While we, unfortunately, know that this is not in all cases an assured protection against diseases or insect enemies, it certainly minimizes the danger and, in itself, is a justification of the high-pressure cultural treatment advocated throughout the preceding pages.

Renovation of Old Groves.

Material improvement of old plantations may sometimes be effected and, unless the trees are known to be upward of fifty years old, generally repays the labor. Marked increase in crop has followed a heavy thinning out of trees upon the Government cocoanut farm at San Ramon, Mindanao. The improvement that a freer circulation of air and abundant sunlight have effected is very marked. Where it can be done, plowing is also sometimes feasible and should be followed by immediate crop improvement. The average native plow is not so well adapted for working over an old or neglected grove as it is for original soil preparation. It acts more as a subsoiler and will tear and lacerate more roots than is desirable. A single carabao, or one-horse American garden plow, is the better implement for this work. Extensive bat guano deposits are found in Mindoro, Guimarás, and Luzon. Some of them show richness in nitrogen and, when accessible at a moderate cost, would be useful in the renovation of old groves, where the shade would be adverse to the rearing of good crops of nitrogen gatherers.

Conclusion.

1. There are large areas throughout the littoral valleys of the Archipelago, as yet unexploited, which, in the essentials of soil, climate, irrigation facilities, and general environment are suitable for cocoanut growing.

2. The present conditions present especially flattering attractions to cocoanut growers capable of undertaking the cultivation upon a scale of some magnitude. By coöperation, small estates could combine in the common ownership of machinery, whereby the products of the grove could be converted into more profitable substances than copra.

3. The present production of copra (estimated at 278,000 piculs in 1902) is an assurance of a sufficient supply to warrant the erection of a high-class modern plant for the manufacture of the ultimate (the “butter”) products of the nut. The products of such an enterprise would be increased by the certainty of a local market in the Philippines for some part of the output. The average market value of the best grades of copra in the Marseilles market is $54.40, gold, per English ton. The jobbing value on January 1 of this year, of the refined products, were, for each ton of copra:

the difference representing the profit per ton, less the cost of manufacture.

4. The minimum size of a plantation, on which economical application of oil and fiber preparing machinery could be made, is 60 hectares.

5. There is no other horticultural tropical product which may be grown in these Islands where crop assurance may be so nearly guaranteed, or natural conditions so nearly controlled by the planter who, knowing correct principles, has the facilities for applying them.

6. The natural enemies and diseases of the plant are relatively few, easily held in check by vigilance and the exercise of competent business management.

7. The labor situation is bound more seriously to affect the small planter, wholly dependent upon hand labor, than the estate conducted on a large enough scale to justify the employment of modern machinery.

8. In view of an ever-expanding demand for cocoanut products, and in the light of the foregoing conclusions, the industry, when prosecuted upon a considerable scale and subject to the requirements previously set forth, promises for many years to be one of the most profitable and desirable enterprises which command the attention of the Filipino planter.

The greatest mine of horticultural wealth which is open to the shrewd planter lies in the heaps of waste and neglected husks that he can now procure from adjoining estates for the asking and cartage.

With labor at 1 peso per diem and at the present price of potash and phosphoric acid, all the husks in excess of 300 per diem which could be hauled would be clear profit. The ashes of these, when burned and applied to the old grove, would have an immediate and revivifying influence.

Many trees in an old plantation have ceased to bear. Whether this is due to exhaustion from old age or from soil exhaustion is immaterial; each should be eradicated and the time-honored custom of replanting a fresh tree in its place abandoned. These renewals are difficult enough in any fruit or nut orchard where the scientific cultural conditions have been of the best. Renewals in a cocoanut grove, unless the vacant space is abnormally large and can be subjected to some years of soil improvement, are unprofitable.

There is a wide range of opinion as to the bearing life of a cocoanut tree. It is said to vary from thirty to one hundred and thirty years. Grown more than forty, or possibly fifty years old, the writer would hesitate to undertake the improvement or renewal of the grove.

Palms, unlike exogenous trees, afford no evidence by which their age may be determined. In general, with advanced years, come great height and great attenuation. In the open, and where fully exposed to atmospheric influences, these form an approximate criterion of age. The so-called annular scars, marking the earlier attachments of leaves, furnish no clue to age.