VANILLA: A PROMISING NEW CROP FOR 
PORTO RICO. 
CONTENTS. 
Introduction 3 
Market prospects 4 
History of experimental planting at the sta- 
tion 5 
Starting a vanillery 8 
Propagation v 10 
Shading 15 
Care of plantation 16 
Blossoming and pollination 18 
Picking 27 
Curing 28 
Preparation for market 30 
Summary 31 
INTRODUCTION. 
For many years Porto Rico has produced only a limited number of 
crops for export, the market fluctuations of two or three staple prod- 
ucts meaning prosperity or ruin for the island. In an insular com- 
munity of this kind, where interchange of products is necessarily 
more restricted than elsewhere, the chances for the introduction of 
new crops are relatively small. The money crop of one island may 
be almost unknown or entirely ignored on another with almost 
identical soil and climatic conditions. Thus vanilla, a successful 
crop in many tropical communities resembling Porto Rico, has so 
far made no headway here. 
Vanilla is produced commercially from within a few degrees of the 
equator to more than 20° north and south of it. It is planted from 
near sea level to altitudes of 2,000 feet or more. With the exception 
of those in Mexico, all of the most extensive plantings have been made 
on islands. Porto Rico, as an island bisected by the eighteenth 
parallel of latitude, should furnish conditions suitable for commercial 
vanilla growing. 
So far as the writer has been able to ascertain, vanilla growing 
on a commercial scale had never been attempted here prior to the 
present time. In fact, the species of economic value are locally 
almost unknown. In a very few scattered gardens over the island 
vanilla is to be found as a curiosity, but to the general public it is an 
unknown exotic. Wild vanilla has been noted in the vicinity of 
Bayamon, Dorado, Lares, Maricao, Mayaguez, San German, Guanica, 
and Guayanilla. This in itself is an indication of the suitability of 
local conditions for the vanilla plant. 
(3) 
