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قراءة كتاب Cacao Culture in the Philippines
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tubes, and, for the sake of uniform moisture, plunge them to their rims in any free, light soil in a well-shaded easily protected spot where they may be carefully watered. In three to six months (according to growth) the tube with its included plant may be planted in the open field, when the former will speedily decompose and the growth of the cacao proceed without check or injury.
At best, all of the above suggested methods are but crude expedients to replace the more workmanlike, expeditious, and satisfactory process of planting the conventional nursery grown stock. There is nothing more difficult in the rearing of cacao seedlings than in growing any other evergreen fruit tree. Briefly stated, it is only the finding of a well-prepared, well-shaded seed bed and sowing the seeds in rows or drills, and, when the seedlings are of proper size, in lifting and transferring them to the plantation. But in actual practice there are many details calling for the exercise of trained judgment from the preparation of the seed bed down to the final process of “hardening off,” concerning which the reader is referred to the many available text-books on general nursery management.
It may be said for the benefit of those unable to adopt more scientific methods: Let the seed bed be selected in a well-shaded spot, and, if possible, upon a rather stiff, plastic, but well-drained soil. After this is well broken up and made smooth, broadcast over all 3 or 4 inches of well-decomposed leaf mold mixed with sand, and in this sow the seed in furrows about 1 inch deep. This sowing should be made during the dry season, not only to avoid the beating and washing of violent storms but to have the nursery plants of proper size for planting at the opening of the rainy season. The seed bed should be accessible to water, in order that it may be conveniently watered by frequent sprinklings throughout the dry season.
The rich top dressing will stimulate the early growth of the seedling, and when its roots enter the heavier soil below it will encourage a stocky growth. Four or five months later the roots will be so well established in the stiffer soil that if lifted carefully each plant may be secured with a ball of earth about its roots, placed in a tray or basket, and in this way carried intact to the field. Plants thus reared give to the inexperienced an assurance of success not always obtained by the trained or veteran planter of bare rooted subjects.
Cultivation.
Planters are united in the opinion that pruning, cutting, or in any way lacerating the roots is injurious to the cacao, and in deference to this opinion all cultivation close to the tree should be done with a harrow-tooth cultivator, or shallow scarifier. All intermediate cultivation should be deep and thorough, whenever the mechanical condition of the soil will permit it. A plant stunted in youth will never make a prolific tree; early and continuous growth can only be secured by deep and thorough cultivation.
Of even more consideration than an occasional root cutting is any injury, however small, to the tree stem, and on this account every precaution should be taken to protect the trees from accidental injury when plowing or cultivating. The whiffletree of the plow or cultivator used should be carefully fendered with rubber or a soft woolen packing that will effectually guard against the carelessness of workmen. Wounds in the bark or stem offer an inviting field for the entry of insects or the spores of fungi, and are, furthermore, apt to be overlooked until the injury becomes deep seated and sometimes beyond repair.
With the gradual extension of root development, cultivation will be reduced to a narrow strip between the rows once occupied by the plantain or the abacá, but, to the very last, the maintenance of the proper soil conditions should be observed by at least one good annual plowing and by as many superficial cultivations as the growth of the trees and the mechanical state of the land will admit.
Pruning.
When left to its own resources the cacao will fruit for an almost indefinite time. When well and strenuously grown it will bear much more abundant fruit from its fifth to its twenty-fifth year, and by a simple process of renewal can be made productive for a much longer time.
A necessary factor to this result is an annual pruning upon strictly scientific lines. The underlying principle involved is, primarily, the fact that the cacao bears its crop directly upon the main branches and trunk, and not upon spurs or twigs; secondly, that wood under three years is rarely fruitful, and that only upon stems or branches of five years or upward does the maximum fruitfulness occur; that the seat of inflorescence is directly over the axil of a fallen leaf, from whence the flowers are born at irregular times throughout the year.
With this necessary, fundamental information as a basis of operations, the rational system of pruning that suggests itself is the maintenance of as large an extension at all times of straight, well-grown mature wood and the perfecting of that by the early and frequent removal of all limbs or branches that the form of the tree does not admit of carrying without overcrowding.
It is desirable that this extension of the branch system should be lateral rather than vertical, for the greater facility with which fruit may be plucked and possible insect enemies fought; and on this account the leading growths should be stopped when a convenient height has been attained.
When well grown and without accident to its leader, the cacao will naturally branch at from 1 to 1.4 meters from the ground. These primary branches are mostly three to five in number, and all in excess of three should be removed as soon as selection can be made of three strongest that are as nearly equidistant from each other as may be. When these branches are from 80 cm. to 1 meter long, and preferably the shorter distance, they are to be stopped by pinching the extremities. This will cause them and the main stem as well to “break,” i. e., to branch in many places.
At this point the vigilance and judgment of the planter are called into greater play. These secondary branches are, in turn, all to be reduced as were the primary ones, and their selection can not be made in a symmetrical whorl, for the habit of the tree does not admit of it, and selection of the three should be made with reference to their future extension, that the interior of the tree should not be overcrowded and that such outer branches be retained as shall fairly maintain the equilibrium of the crown.
This will complete the third year and the formative stage of the plant. Subsequent prunings will be conducted on the same lines, with the modification that when the secondary branches are again cut back, the room in the head of the tree will rarely admit of more than one, at most two, tertiary branches being allowed to remain. When these are grown to an extent that brings the total height of the tree to 3 or 4 meters, they should be cut back annually, at the close of the dry season. Such minor operations as the removal of thin, wiry, or hide-bound growths and all suckers suggest themselves to every horticulturist, whether he be experienced in cacao growing or not. When a tree is exhausted by overbearing, or has originally been so ill formed that it is not productive, a strong sucker or “gourmand” springing from near the ground may be encouraged to grow. By distributing the pruning over two or three periods, in one year the old tree can be entirely removed and its place substituted by the “gourmand.” During the third