will then germinate when planted. He concludes from 
the evidence that he presents that ‘‘bottle-gourds con- 
taining sound seeds are dispersed far and wide by the 
currents’’ and that ‘‘the gourds themselves will float for 
probably a year or more. ”’ 
The coconut is another plant generally agreed to have 
been in both the New and Old World in Pre-Columbian 
times. The fruit of this palm, although its construction 
is quite different from that of the bottle-gourd, is also 
well adapted for water dispersal. Indeed its pericarp is 
essentially a floating organ. There is substantial evidence 
that the coconut has been widely dispersed by means of 
the sea (Ridley, 1930, p. 322). 
From actual tests conducted by Edmondson (1941), 
it was proved that the seed of the coconut remained via- 
ble after having floated for 110 days in the ocean. This 
author further states that, given favorable conditions, a 
conservative estimate of the distance a coconut fruit 
might travel in that length of time would be 3,000 miles. 
In a private communication to Bruman (1941, p. 289) 
he says that he is convinced that a coconut would sur- 
vive a much longer period than four months, but prob- 
ably not one of seven months. 
A more recent experiment with coconuts was carried 
on in connection with the voyage of the Kon-Tiki. Half 
of the coconuts taken were placed in baskets on the deck, 
while the remainder were stored beneath the raft where 
they were constantly washed by sea water. The result 
of this experiment was that the submerged fruits lost 
their viability; the others remained viable. However, 
the conditions under which the submerged lot of coco- 
nuts were placed do not completely simulate natural 
water dispersal. A coconut fruit in the sea floats buoy- 
antly and is only partially submerged beneath the surface. 
Certainly the evidence for water dispersal for Lagen- 
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