38 



COCOA AND CHOCOLATE 



of the year these trees have no leaves, they are a mass 

 of flame-coloured flowers, each " shafted like a scimi- 

 tar." It well repays the labour of climbing a hill to look 

 down on this vermilion glory. Some Trinidad planters 

 believe that their trees would die without shade, yet 

 in Grenada, onlv a hundred miles North as the steamer 

 sails, there are whole plantations without a single shade 



Cacao Trees, shaded by Kapok (Eriudendron Anjractuosum) 



in Java. 



(Reproduced from van Hall's Cocoa, by permission of Messrs. Macmillan & Co. I 



tree. The Grenadians say : " You cannot have pods 

 without flowers, and you cannot have good flowering 

 without light and air." Shade trees are not used on 

 some estates in San Thome, and in Brazil there are 

 cocoa kings with 200,000 trees without one shade tree. 

 It should be mentioned, however, that in these coun- 

 tries the cacao trees are planted more closely (about 

 eight feet apart) and themselves shade the soil. Pro- 

 fessor Carmody, in reporting* recently on the result 

 of a four years' experiment with (1) shade, (2) nc 



* Bulletin Dept. of Agriculture, Trinidad, 1916. 



