V 



FIELD CULTURE 



165 



copra-manufacture. By that time the husk has become 

 shrunken, the meat thoroughly hard, and the hollow 

 inside it about one-third empty, so that when it is 

 shaken the water will make a sharp splash against the 

 meat. The nut loses in weight and size for more than 

 two months before it is ripe, but throughout this 

 shrinkage there is a material increase in the content 

 of oil. 



This change in weight as the nut ripens is shown 

 by the following analyses of San Kamon nuts, by 

 Walker. 





Hardly ripe. 

 Average of 

 10 nuts. 



Fairly ripe. 

 Average of 

 9 nuts. 



Dead ripe. 

 Average of 

 10 nuts. 



Husk 

 Shell 

 Meat 

 Water 



Total 



2779 g. 

 227 

 405 

 547 



1268 g. 

 214 

 465 

 437 



520 g. 

 201 

 453 

 384 



3958 



2384 



1558 



These nuts were all taken at one time from one tree. 



As the husk grows tougher and the shell harder, 

 at the same time that the nut becomes much lighter 

 in ripening, dead ripe nuts are very much less likely 

 to be broken by falling from high trees than are nuts 

 which are not fully ripe. If nuts are harvested by 

 cutting, it is impossible in practice to wait until each 

 bunch is fully ripe, and in old groves there is always 

 an appreciable loss, from the breaking of some of the 

 nuts not yet ready to fall. Moreover, if the nuts are 

 cut it is not economically possible to separate the dead 

 ripe nuts from those nearly ripe, even though they can 

 be distinguished. They are all opened together, and 

 in this way some oil is lost, and the copra produced is 

 not uniform. In a business sense the most inexcusable 

 of all losses on a coco-nut plantation is that resulting 

 from the production of any but the highest possible 

 grade of copra. This is equally true, whether the 



