Henequen — The Yucatan Fiber 



57 



difference is in the class of plants. This 

 phase is a comparatively new one on 

 the plantations of Yucatan fiber and has 

 only recently been taken into serious 

 consideration. 



The scion when planted ( ' ' anchored ' ' 

 would perhaps be the better word, as it 

 is more often held by heavy stones than 

 by the earth around it) , needs no special 

 care or irrigation. Once or twice a 

 season the fields are roughly weeded. 

 The plant thrives, and generally in 

 about five years the earlier leaves com- 

 mence to extend themselves laterally at 

 right angles to the trunk of the plant. 

 This is nature's signal that the fiber 

 has reached its highest point of tensile 

 strength and that the leaves are ready 

 to be cut. The native cutters then 

 throng the field, and with their corbas 

 deftly cut the leaves close to the trunk, 

 trim off each line of side thorns at a 

 single stroke, snip off the horny end, 

 and bind up the leaves in bundles. Tram 

 cars take these bundles and carry them 

 to the cleaning machine. 



THE ENEMIES OF THE PLANT 



Fire is its greatest enemy. Hot sea- 

 sons do not affect it. In fact, the heat 

 of the sun, especially when accompanied 

 by dampness, seems to act as a tonic. 

 It is then, if ever, that the plant re- 

 covers from its injuries. The greatest 

 heat experienced in Yucatan for the 

 last ten years was in July, 1900, when 

 the thermometer reached 119° F. in the 

 half shade of a veranda ; 147° F. has 

 been experienced in the sun on the 

 principal street of Merida. Long 

 droughts may delay its development, 

 and by wilting the mature leaves cause 

 them to double and injure the fiber, but 

 it cannot stop the ultimate growth of 

 the healthy plant, once it is well rooted. 

 Rainy seasons do not seriously affect 

 the plants, except those in stagnant 

 water. This weakens the plant, but 

 this condition is not common. Cold 

 seasons of the kind that Yucatan ex- 



periences do not seriously affect the 

 plant. The coldest known period was in 

 February, 1899, when the thermometer 

 registered 47 ° F. 



But fire conquers it. Let a spark 

 from a locomotive, the lighted end of a 

 cigarette, or the embers of a fire made 

 to heat the bread of the native workers 

 start the flames in an ill-cleaned field, 

 and nothing but a miracle can save the 

 crop from total loss. It is said that 

 some planters in the past have taken 

 advantage of the susceptibility of the 

 plant to artificial heat, and when young 

 plants were desired for export, they 

 were doctored before delivery by having 

 their roots heated over heated embers 

 or dipped into boiling water. The effects 

 of this treatment are not perceptible for 

 a time, and possibly this fact may make 

 clear to some enthusiastic foreign planter 

 why his scions, purchased with so much 

 care and expense, never grew and pros- 

 pered. Naturally, the Mexicans do not 

 desire to have the plant that is such a 

 valuable product of their country made 

 common. 



Next to fire, a large, long-nosed black 

 beetle is the greatest enemy of the cul- 

 tivated sisal. It is known to the natives 

 as the ' ' max. ' ' Dr Gaumer, an Ameri- 

 can physician residing in Yucatan, 

 whose studies and writings upon the 

 fauna and flora of Yucatan have made 

 his name familiar to naturalists every- 

 where, at my request writes of the 

 insect: 



' ' The female insect lays its eggs on 

 the trunk of the henequen plant a few 

 inches above the ground. When batched 

 the larva burrows into and through the 

 outer bark to the harder fiber of the 

 interior, when it generally takes an up- 

 ward direction and burrows from 6 to 

 12 inches during its larval existence. 

 When full grown it works its way to 

 the bark, where it changes to a pupa 

 and so remains for some months, when 

 it hatches into the adult beetle and 

 emerges from the plant, which it leaves 



