Chapter III 

 The Selection of a Plantation 



CONSIDERING the cost, length of time, 

 and sustained effort involved in developing 

 an estate from its initial stages to the point 

 of production, it is obvious that questions of locality 

 and site of a coconut plantation are matters of vital 

 importance. If the greatest discrimination is not 

 exercised in their selection, both time and money 

 will be squandered in abortive effort ; the work of 

 correcting initial blunders, too, is both tedious and 

 costly. Native and even other planters make 

 many errors from ignorance or carelessness, the 

 most general taking the form of irregular and 

 crowded planting, which invariably proves a false 

 economy, and results in an estate which could be 

 made to pay handsomely by the mere application of 

 proper methods of cultivation returning little or 

 nothing to the owners. Europeans who acquire 

 native properties have to deal with this error 

 at the outset, for apart from the direct loss in 

 coconuts it is necessary to leave ample space be- 

 tween the trees for catch crops, which can be made 



