V 



FIELD CULTURE 



161 



Good treatment of the coco-nut is a full system of 

 procedure, not a single act, nor a spasmodic burst of 

 attention. In order that any detail of the treatment of 

 a grove, however strongly to be recommended in itself, 

 may have the results which in a business sense should 

 be expected from it, it must be co-ordinated with all 

 of the other treatment which the plantation has received 

 and will receive in the future. The propriety of using 

 fertilizers depends not merely upon the amount and 

 upon their cost, and the cost of possible extension of 

 the grove, but also upon every detail of the treatment 

 which the grove receives in other respects, and upon 

 the attention which is given to all of the other needs 

 of the trees. 



It is presumably because of the complexity of the 

 problem and of the difficulty in the interpretation of 

 results, and still more because of the long time which 

 must intervene between the application of fertilizers 

 and the drawing of even approximately final conclusions, 

 that reports from the various governmental stations 

 which have undertaken such work with coco-nuts are 

 still wanting. At least four such stations in the 

 tropics have published accounts of the undertaking of 

 systematic work of this kind, but none of them have 

 as yet made the results public. 



We turn now to a brief discussion of the fertilizers 

 which are to be recommended, although on other grounds 

 than a sufficient knowledge of the results of their 

 application. The first and greatest need of the tree 

 seems to be that for potash. This can be furnished 

 in the form of ashes or manure, or as a commercial 

 fertilizer. The second need, for nitrogen, will in most 

 cases be most economically supplied by the use of green 

 manures. The necessity of furnishing nitrogen depends 

 upon the method in which the grove is handled. If 

 it is kept clean by the burning of the fallen leaves 

 more nitrogen will be lost by the soil than if these 

 leaves are permitted to decay. If the grove is used 

 for pasture this may consist in considerable part of 



M 



