366 



THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 



November 17, 1906-. 



THE ECONOMIC USES OF THE PALMS. 



The following is a summary of a paper read by 

 Mr. W. R. Butten.shaw, M.A., B.Sc, Scientific Assistant 

 on the staff of the Imperial Department of Agriculture, 

 before the Barbados Natural History Society on 

 October 17, 1906:— 



No natural order of plants, with the e.xceiition of the 

 grasses, is of greater im[>ortance to man in tropical countries 

 than this princely family, which supplies him with food, 

 drink, clothing, and building materials. The Chaldeans, 

 several thousand years ago, are said to have been indebted 

 to the date palm for their food, clothing, wine, and timber 

 for their houses. In Porto Rico today, the natives use the 

 royal palm {Oreodoxa rer/ia) for almost every possible 

 purpose, from the siding of a house to the body of a saddle. 



Of food products, palms yield edible fruits, wine, sugar, 

 starch, and oil. The food found in a palm is stored up by 

 the plant for further use. In the seed it is for the plantlet, 

 when it begins its growth, as in the cocoa-nut. In the 

 fruits it is to attract animals to scatter the seeds, as in the 

 date. In the stem, it is stored to enable the palm to produce 

 rapidly a great mass of flowers or fruit, as in the sago palm, 

 which takes fifteen years to produce the first flower-spike. 



OIL-PRODUCING P.\LMS. 



Oil is the principal food product yielded by palms, and 

 is produced chiefly by the cocoa-nut [Cocos nucifera), the oil 

 palm (E/(ftis ;/u'iiei'iisis), and the cohune uut (Attalca Coltunr). 

 The oils from the two former are very largely emjiloyed in 

 soap and candle making. While the cocoa-nut palm is 

 widely distributed throughout all the tropicat regions, the oil 

 palm is practically confined to West Africa. Since 18-10 the 

 trade in both these oils has largely developed through their 

 use in the manufacture of candles. 



The cocoa-nut is the most important of all the food- 

 producing palms. Cocoa-nut oil is obtained by boiling and 

 pressing the white kernel of the nut. In addition to the use of 

 the oil in the manufacture of soap and candles, the nuts and 

 oil ff>rm a large proportion of the food of the natives of many 

 tropical countries. The milk affords a most refreshing 

 beverage. The many articles which can be made from the 

 hard shells are familiar to all. From the fibrous husk the 

 useful fibre known as coir is obtained ; this is chiefly used in 

 the manufacture of cocoa-nut matting. Many other articles 

 of minor importance are also made from it. From the outer 

 portion of the trunk is obtained an extremely hard wood 

 used in the construction of houses and furniture. It is known 

 in England as porcupine wood, and is chiefly used for inlaying. 

 Of late years a new product of the cocoa-nut has been 

 appearing on the market as a substitute for butter. This is 

 known as cocoa-nut butter or 'nucoline,' also as ' vegetaline.' 



The cocoa-nut industry is now one of great importance 

 in many tropical countries, notably, Cej'lon and the .Seychelles. 

 In the West Indies, Trinidad and .Jamaica have e.xtensive 

 cocoa-nut plantations, from which large numbers of cocoa- 

 nuts are shipped annually to the United Kingdom and the 

 United States. Most large plantations now have drying 

 apparatus by which the white ' meat ' can be converted into 

 copra. Some have also oil-pressing machinery for the 

 extraction of cocoa-nut oil. After the expression of the oil 

 there remains a cake (poonac), which, like other oil cakes, is 

 useful as a manure. 



Palm-nut oil is the product of Elaeis {/iiintetn-iii, which 

 is very abundant in West Africa, whence it has been 

 introduced into the West Indies. It produces den.se heads 



of small, orange-yellow fruits about the size of an olive. The 

 oil is obtained from the pulp of the fruits by boiling them in 

 water and skimming oft" the oil as it rises to the surface. 

 Commercial palm oil is usually al>out the consistence of 

 butter, of an orange-red colour, with a pleasant odour of 

 violets when ireah. In Africa it is used as butter. Palm 

 oil closely resembles cocoa-nut oil in its chemical and physical 

 characteristics. It has largely siijiplanted the latter in the 

 manufacture of the cheaper kinds of .soap. It is principally 

 used in the manufacture of candles. Oil is also now obtained 

 from the kernels which were formerly thrown away. 



The cohune palm {Attalca Cohune) yields cohune nut 

 oil. It is a native of Central America. Each fruit is about 

 the size of an egg. The oil, which is used for illuminating 

 purposes, is considered superior to cocoa-nut oil, but it is 

 difficult to extract the kernel from the hard shell. 



D.\TE P.\L.M. 



The date palm is a handsome palm, 60 to 80 feet high, 

 found through Northern Africa, India, and south-eastern 

 Asia. Its tall, straight trunk, covered with the scars of 

 fallen leafstalks, is surmounted with a tuft of feathery 

 leaves. It has the male and female flowers on separate 

 individuals, and, in its natural state, the female flowers are 

 pollinated by the wind. Each female tree produces from 

 six to twenty flower clusters, each of which gives ri.se to 

 a bunch of dates. At the base of the stem a number 

 of suckers arise, and by these off-shoots the tree should be 

 propagated, rather than from seed. It yields fruit at five or 

 six years, but does not come into full bearing for twentv to 

 twenty-five years, after which it continues bearing for about 

 180 years. Trees in full bearing produce eight to ten 

 bunches, each containing 1 2 lb. to 20 lb. of fruit. Egypt has 

 about 4,000,000 trees, yielding annually about 5,00(\b00 cwt. 

 of fruit. Tunis has about half that number. The exports 

 of dates from the Persian Gulf region amount to about 

 30,000 cwt. annually. 



BETEL NUT PALM. 



The Areca or Betel uut palm {Areca Catechu) is a native 

 of the Malay Archipelago. The seeds are chewed by the 

 ^lalays, even by children. They are supposed to prevent 

 dysentery and to promote digestion. They colour the mouth 

 red. The seeds are sliced and rolled in betel pepper leaves 

 with a little lime. In England they are manufactured into 

 tooth powder. 



SUGAR-PKODUCINi; P.\LM.S. 



Several palms produce palm sugar, the most important 

 of which is the wild date (Phoenix si//vcstris), which 

 is much used in India for obtaining sugar. There are 

 even regular plantations of it. The tree gives the full 

 average yield of juice in its eighth year. In collecting the 

 juice, the lower leaves of the branching head are stripp>ed off 

 to leave a denuded space about 1 foot long ; from this 

 a triangular piece of bark is cut out. As soon as the sap 

 begins to run, a reed is fixed at the lowest point of the 

 triangle to carry the juice to a pot suspended below it. The 

 wound is renewed by cutting a fresh thin slice from time to 

 time until it is exhausted. The juice is concentrated by 

 evaporation in open pans. It is estimated that 100 trees 

 will yield as much as .3,-500 lb. of thick sugar per annum; 

 also that the produce from an acre is e(juivalent to 5J- tons 

 of muscovado sugar. 



[To be iOHcluded.) 



