SELECTION OF SEED 117 



in especially rich soil, or because it is well watered or 

 well fertilized, or because it is freely illuminated on all 

 sides, then no matter how conspicuously productive it 

 may be, there is no sound reason for choosing it as the 

 source of seed. Seeds are chosen for their hereditary 

 qualities, and a good environment cannot be inherited. 

 A tree in the middle of a grove which regularly pro- 

 duces more nuts or larger nuts than its neighbours, 

 and is without any compensating drawback, should be 

 selected as the source of seed, even though a tree at the 

 outside of the same grove which is still more productive 

 be passed over. 



The selection of nuts from piles or at any time after 

 they are cut from the tree is not to be recommended. 

 A tree bearing very few nuts is for that reason likely 

 to bear large ones, and it will thus often happen that 

 the selection of large nuts from the nut pile is in effect 

 selection from trees which are not very productive. More- 

 over, there is a| chance that the large nuts in general 

 nut piles are from trees which produce large nuts because 

 they grow under especially favourable conditions, and, 

 as we have just seen, there is no reason whatever why 

 the fruit of such trees, however good it may be, should 

 be selected for propagation. 



When the trees which are to be the source of seed 

 nuts have been selected, their nuts should be regarded 

 as having a value which is based on the value of the 

 trees they will produce, and as therefore out of all pro- 

 portion to the value which they have as mere nuts. It 

 is worth while to harvest these nuts with a care which 

 would be economically impossible for nuts intended for 

 the production of copra. It is well worth while to collect 

 the nuts of a good seed tree by lowering them to the 

 ground by hand in order that there can be no risk of 

 breaking or cracking them. A cracked nut will never 

 germinate. 



The nuts are ready to be used for seed at the same 

 time at which they are really ready to be used for 

 copra, that is, when a third or a half of the water in 



