90 COCONUT PLANTER'S MANUAL. 



After or just before manuring the plantation should be ploughed 

 hi Forked deep. 



This treatment is sufficient for two years for Avet districts with a 

 rainfall from 75 to lOO, but another shallow ploughing a year after 

 could be done with advantage. In dry districts where the rainfall is 

 from 50 to 75 or less, an animal ploughing is essential and disc-harrow- 

 ing during the dry months. In rainy weather grain crops of the 

 leguminous oreer should be grown. It should be borne in mind tha T . 

 the cultivation of coconuts is a business, and the owner of the land is 

 the manufacturer or producer of copra. His capital is the stock of 

 plant-food in his soil and his machinery is his trees. His aim should 

 be to produce copra at the smallest expenditure of labour and plant-food. 

 His capital is s limited one, which is liable to be exhausted if not re- 

 plenished from time to time to make good the exhaustion due to the 

 removal of copra. It must be remembered that 2/3 of a pound of copra 

 is oil and the other 1/3 is poonac. The soil does not so much suiter by 

 the removal of oil as by the removal of poonac. If therefore poonac can 

 be purchased at a cheap rate it would be wise to use as much of it as 

 possible in manuring the land. 



Coconut iiusks, leaves, etc., if removed off the land should be re- 

 t ui ned to it or sold at a price to enable some fertilizers to be used in 

 place of them. If they be returned to the land the soil will not only 

 get back what it has lost but also what has been taken up from the 

 atmosphere. The failure of some coconut estates during drought is due 

 to the depletion of organic matter in the soil caused by the continuous 

 removal of leaves, husks, &c. 



Coconut husks should be used for mulching round the trees. If 

 husks have to be sold the equivalent of fibre dust should taken back 

 to tho estate and ploughed in. 



Picking. — Perfectly ripe nuts only should be picked. This could 

 be dono by picking two bunches only once in two months. Allowing lipo 

 nuts to drop is to be recommended, though this is not always_a prac- 

 ticable courso for many reasons. 



Copra. — Tho preparation of copra is effected either by sun-drying 

 or by artificial heat. Sun-dried copra is superior to kiln-dried copra. 

 It is possible, to some extent, to prepare sun-dried copra during a large 

 part of the year if the curing be done in the following periods : — 



The January crop — in March (dry month). 



.March and May crops in July. 



July crop in September. 



September and November crops in January. 



