The coconut odyssey: the bounteous possibilities of th e tree life

The coconut odyssey the bounteous possibilities of the tree of life

Mike Foale Mike Foale

current spine width is 7mm. If it needs to be adjusted, modify the width of the coconut shells image, which should wrap from the spine to the front cover e coconut odyssey: the bounteous possibilities of the tree of life

e coconut odyssey the bounteous possibilities of the tree of life

Mike Foale

Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research Canberra 2003 e Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) was established in June 1982 by an Act of the Australian Parliament. Its primary mandate is to help identify agricultural problems in developing countries and to commission collaborative research between Australian and developing country researchers in fields where Australia has special competence.

Where trade names are used this constitutes neither endorsement of nor discrimination against any product by the Centre.

ACIAR MONOGRAPH SERIES

is series contains the results of original research supported by ACIAR, or material deemed relevant to ACIAR’s research and development objectives. e series is distributed internationally, with an emphasis on developing countries.

© Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research, GPO Box 1571, Canberra ACT 2601. http://www.aciar.gov.au email: [email protected]

Foale, M. 2003. e coconut odyssey: the bounteous possibilities of the tree of life. ACIAR Monograph No. 101, 132p.

ISBN 1 86320 369 9 (printed) ISBN 1 86320 370 2 (online)

Editing and design by Clarus Design, Canberra Printed by Brown Prior Anderson, Melbourne Foreword

Coconut is a tree of great versatility. the environment. Its publication by I congratulate Mike Foale on his It provides food, drink, clothing ACIAR in 2003 is also noteworthy, efforts in writing this important and shelter, as well as a source of in that ACIAR’s support for coconut publication, and in assembling its income from its products. Coconut research and development in Asia comprehensive set of illustrations. can grow in fragile environments, and the Pacific began in 1983, I commend it to all interested to on coasts and coral atolls where few and was amongst the first areas learn more about the ‘tree of life’. other species survive. In extreme of activity in ACIAR’s portfolio weather, the coconut provides refuge of collaborative research projects. Gabrielle J. Persley and sustenance to coastal and island is support continues today, with Chair, International Coconut communities. e health-promoting a new ACIAR coconut project Support Group properties of coconut are increasingly commencing at the University of being recognised. Yet coconut is too Queensland. often seen as a ‘sunset crop’, with is publication also comes at a time little future, unable to compete in when the International Coconut export markets with palm kernel oil Genetic Resources Network and, more recently, with genetically (COGENT) is determining its modified rapeseed oil. future strategy to ensure the long- is timely publication summarises term conservation of coconut genetic the case for coconut. It describes resources, and their use through a ways in which the full potential of global program of coconut research coconut and its benefits may be and development activities. realised for better health, food and

5

Contents

Foreword 5 Preface 13 Chapter 1. e coconut odyssey begins 15 But let us start at the beginning … ...... 16 Evolution of the coconut ...... 17 Friendship with a crab ...... 19 Coconut diversity and the human factor ...... 20 Completing the equatorial circle ...... 22 Australia’s coconut story: a remarkable absence in precolonial times ...... 23 Were Aborigines consumers but not growers? ...... 24 e scourge of a native rat ...... 24 Loss of coconut seedlings and older palms ...... 25 Coping with sea-level rise ...... 25 Coastal explorers in Australia ...... 25 Planting by Australian colonists ...... 26 e coconut redeployed in an ornamental role ...... 27 What are the environmental limits for the coconut? ...... 28 Extreme latitude: the coconut seedling as an indoor plant ...... 30 Can the coconut palm be regarded as a native Australian plant? ...... 31 Chapter 2. Surprising diversity among coconuts—adaptations to new environments and to human demands 33 How many varieties of coconut are there? ...... 34 Telling the difference between a Tall and a Dwarf palm ...... 35 Drought tolerance ...... 36 Tolerance of low temperature ...... 37 Tolerance of insect and disease attack ...... 37

7 e strand posed few biohazards ...... 38 Diversity among Dwarfs ...... 38 Diversity among palms introduced into Australia ...... 40 Exploiting diversity with hybrids ...... 42 Chapter 3. e life story of a palm: from seed to first fruit 43 Starting with the seed … ...... 44 e husk hides the very young seedling ...... 45 e seedling ‘sponges’ from the kernel ...... 46 Growth of the independent seedling ...... 47 Flowering begins ...... 47 What gives the palm crown its great shape? ...... 48 Crown shape responds to age ...... 49 Fruiting begins: a competition for resources ...... 50 Why does the palm on the strand lean towards the water? ...... 51 Maintaining a grip on the earth ...... 51 Dwarfs are at greater risk than Talls ...... 53 Survivors can last (almost) forever ...... 53 Chapter 4. Taking the plunge: looking after your own palms 55 Latitude and climate might restrict potential ...... 56 Study the soil and take expert advice ...... 56 e coconut is ‘building friendly’ ...... 57 Choosing the best variety for your purpose ...... 57 Managing the nursery and planting out ...... 58 Protecting the young palm ...... 58 How soon will the palms flower? ...... 59 Australian environments and the coconut ...... 60

8 Chapter 5. Caring for the palm from planting out till flowering and beyond 63 Palatable palms attract hungry creatures ...... 64 Nut-fall bugs undermine yield ...... 65 e greatest threat: lethal yellowing disease ...... 65 Other viroid and virus diseases ...... 66 Weed competition ...... 67 Low humidity endangers fruit ...... 68 Physical hazards during the palm’s life ...... 68 Soil: pH, nutrients and salinity ...... 69 Sea-spray on the palm leaf ...... 70 Fertiliser needs in Australia ...... 70 Visual foliage guide: symptoms and nutrients ...... 70 Chapter 6. e productive palm: potential profit or hazard? 75 First fruits: harvest or damage control? ...... 76 Potential yield ...... 76 Harvesting young palms ...... 76 Beware: falling fruits ...... 78 Harvesting for production and to reduce hazard ...... 79 Indigenous harvesting skills ...... 79 Rats can make fruits fall ...... 80 Fruit removal changes the look of the palm ...... 80 Profiting from fruit removal ...... 80 By-products for fuel and thatching ...... 81 Chapter 7. e fruit and its parts 83 Legacies of evolution ...... 84 Wild-type palms bear small fruit ...... 84 Large fruits were carried far ...... 84 Large fruit for high yield, small fruit for natural dispersal ...... 85 Nut water as a fresh local product ...... 85 Confusing water and milk ...... 86 Coconut cream and coconut milk ...... 87

9 Traditional coconut cream and milk preparation ...... 87 Coconut in your kitchen ...... 88 e kernel as food: solid or shredded ...... 88 Coconut oil: a major trading commodity ...... 89 Industrial processing of coconut oil ...... 89 Virgin coconut oil: a valuable new product ...... 90 Husk and fibre: versatile raw materials ...... 90 Coconut shell: fuel and toolmaking material ...... 91 Coconut products available in Australia ...... 93 Chapter 8. Abundant products: health drink, liquor, structural components, shade, fuel and more 94 Coconut sap for toddy and sugar ...... 95 Uses for the frond ...... 95 Fuel from the old flower parts ...... 96 Palm wood: strength and beauty ...... 96 Preserving and milling the coconut log ...... 98 Precision cutting recovers the best wood ...... 99 Coconut shade benefits other crops ...... 99 An image with global appeal ...... 100 Chapter 9. Selecting a sound coconut at the market, and processing it at home 102 Preparing a ‘tender nut’: a specialised task ...... 103 Dehusking: a choice of tools ...... 103 Buying a fresh mature nut ...... 104 Recovering the water ...... 106 Recovering the kernel ...... 107 Ways to use the kernel ...... 108 Shredding the kernel for coconut cream and coconut milk ...... 109 Coconut milk: culinary uses ...... 110 Extracting oil from shredded kernel ...... 110 Separating coconut oil from coconut milk ...... 110

10 Chapter 10. e coconut’s industrial history, and future 111 Industrial demand builds the early copra trade ...... 112 War brings competitors ...... 112 Failure to stop a downhill slide of market demand ...... 113 Demand for lauric oils underpins market ...... 114 e legacy of copra production ...... 115 Small-scale and medium-scale processing for high-quality products ...... 116 Some food uses require economies of scale ...... 117 Coconut oil as engine fuel ...... 118 Nut water or coconut juice ...... 118 Possibilities for derivatives of coconut sap (toddy) ...... 118 Processing fibre and shell requires specialised skills ...... 118 Niche marketing of high-value products ...... 120 Chapter 11. e wonder food 121 A valuable staple since antiquity ...... 122 Coconut’s market grows, then collapses ...... 122 Saturated and unsaturated fats ...... 123 Competitors play dirty ...... 123 Marketers demolish reputations, invoke obesity ...... 127 Some competitor products harm health ...... 128 Coconut helps overcome obesity ...... 129 Diabetes and hypothyroidism ...... 132 Restoring the status of coconut oil ...... 132

11

Preface

Few plants are more universally So deeply is the coconut immersed I include a description of the known, admired and acclaimed in the culture and diet of tropical extraordinary economic situation than the coconut palm, Cocos people of the East and the Pacific into which the coconut was forced, nucifera. Its graceful appearance islands that it is honoured among a hundred years after it was so and bountiful harvest, combined them as the Tree of Life. Every enthusiastically embraced by with its environmental resilience part of the palm and fruit is used, the industrial world. Beginning even under the stress of cyclonic especially the milk, oil and flesh of in the 1950s, the producers of storms, have led to its pan-tropical the nut itself. Even the roots provide polyunsaturated fats—the market establishment and use in moist valuable medication for the relief rivals of coconut oil—ran a coastal environments. Hundreds of dysentery. However, it was the sustained and highly successful of millions of people consume each great 19th century surge in demand campaign against coconut oil and day both coconut water and kernel for fats and oils by industrialising other saturated fats. I explain how, derivatives—especially the milk Europe and North America that in this context, coconut oil came to squeezed from the shredded kernel placed coconut oil centre stage as be almost universally considered a and the extracted oil. a global trade commodity. is dangerous food, in spite of its role ushered in an era of industrial as an energy staple in the diet of Long after Portuguese sailors first cropping of the palm on practically tropical island and coast dwellers brought the coconut home to Lisbon every tract of available fertile land in for hundreds of generations. from voyages to ‘the Indies’ at the end the moist coastal tropics, between In particular, the producers of of the 15th century, the nut became the late 19th and the mid-20th margarine, cooking oil and other popular in the temperate markets centuries. e Tree of Life of the derivatives of temperate-zone of Europe and the United States. It tropical village became, briefly, vegetable oils sought to displace became a staple ingredient in cakes the tree of economic life for many coconut oil as the preferred deep- and biscuits, and at English fairs, the investors, traders and processors in frying oil. ‘bare’ coconut fruit was transformed the West. A calamitous decline in into a target and prize (‘a lovely demand followed. bunch of coconuts’) in a bowling game known as the ‘coconut shy’.

13 is book summarises the e remarkable evolution and is book presents the coconut astonishing course of that botanical traits of the coconut as food, crop, and cultural displacement, along with evidence palm help to explain its durability, and landscape icon, tracing that might help restore the coconut its diversity and its distribution. its evolutionary history and to its deserved status as one of Characteristics that evolved endeavouring to restore its nature’s most useful and valuable during the coconut’s odyssey ‘from reputation. I put the case for the foods and cooking oils. Since the Gondwana to Goa and Zamboanga’ coconut in the hope that people ‘food war’ began, both knowledge of and beyond enabled it to spread in developed and developing the role of coconut oil as medicine naturally and widely across oceans, countries alike can rediscover, for the in traditional cultures and modern and to nurture, over many months, advancement of their own welfare, biochemical research have pointed to the coconut seedling taking hold the economic, health and culinary great possibilities for coconut oil as a on a distant shore. I give special possibilities of the coconut palm. health food and antibiotic. attention to the place of the coconut in Australia, a land of extensive I also give guidance for those who Mike Foale tropical shores that was almost want to get the most out of having October 2002 completely devoid of coconut palms a coconut palm as a fruit tree, or to Brisbane, Australia before European settlement. profit from growing many palms as a plantation enterprise on any scale. e many possibilities for deriving products, not only from the nut contents but from every part of the palm— frond, growing ‘heart’, trunk, shell and fibre—are catalogued here.

14 chapter 1 e coconut odyssey begins

A source of food, oil and milk, the coconut has probably been used by humans and their immediate ancestor species for at least half a million years. Its geographical spread—literally around the globe—was aided by waves of mariners migrating and trading between the coconut’s homelands and ever more distant islands, from Asia to the Americas. In tropical climes, where the coconut palm is indeed the Tree of Life, it provides food and work for those who add value to its products. A symbol of dreamy relaxation, the coconut palm is used to promote romantic, indulgent holidays in the sun for people of the temperate zone. Less attractive is the coconut’s sometimes exaggerated ability to cause injury, or even death, when it falls from a great height to injure an unsuspecting seeker of the palm-tree ambience promoted in those glossy tourist brochures.

15 But let us start at the flat sandy or gravelly strip formed by waves of mariners dating back at beginning … the sea and associated with low sand least 4000 years to the time of the dunes raised by the wind. first Polynesians. More recently, e story of the coconut is part of it has been realised that the wild e coconut palm spawned a the saga of the great landmass of the coconut probably reached most of buoyant seed, which could drift Southern Hemisphere, Gondwana, the shores in South-East Asia and back and forth among the shifting which began to break up around 80 the Pacific, where it is now found, lands and which was carried by the million years ago. Huge sections of many millennia ago and through the seas to many shores of tropical Asia the earth’s crust—known as tectonic agency of its floating seeds. Different and Oceania long before humans plates—carried land surfaces that forms of the coconut have since been intervened to disperse it further. e now comprise Australia, some spread by the Polynesians and other large, energy-filled seed provided islands to its north and north-east, seafarers. ere is an intriguing a nourishing welcome for the first New Zealand, Madagascar, most story, told below, about this absence human inhabitants of these coasts. of Africa and South America, and from Australia. most of the landmass of India, Humans have probably been using e story of the coconut and its Pakistan and Bangladesh. e now the coconut for around half a million presence around the globe is one in Australasian sections of Gondwana years, although it is very difficult to which evolution, immigration, trade, drifted generally northwards, lately establish an precise time for its first other cultural practices and the forces at a rate of 70–150 kilometres use. e sea level has fluctuated up of nature all play a part. If the theories every million years. e Antarctic and down by one hundred metres of the palaeogeographers are correct, continent, meanwhile, moved south and more, many times during that the shores of northern Australia may to become centred over the South period, ‘drowning’ much evidence of have been an important habitat in Pole. Africa began a little south of early relationships between humans which the ancient palm evolved over where it is now, while the South and the coconut. American landmass had drifted geological time. In 1788 (the year of the first westwards. European settlement in Australia) e ancestral coconut palm grew on and for 60 years afterwards, there the northern coasts of Gondwana were no reports of coconut palms fragments. e tree evolved into its on the thousands of kilometres niche on the strand—the narrow of Australia’s tropical shores. is strip of land immediately above the curious absence was noted by high-tide line—where it was lapped explorers as early as the 18th century. by warm oceans. On these coasts, Authorities later theorised that the the strand often includes a berm—a coconut had been transported to far-flung islands and continents by

16 Evolution of the coconut likely to have been warm and stormy. One vital adaptation was the e behaviour of the weather in development of a flexible trunk that e ocean to the north of the modern warm seas suggests that elongates rapidly in the early life migrating Indian and Australian periodic cyclones battered the coastal of the palm, eventually becoming landmasses and associated islands, vegetation of the islands and large able to bend without snapping in 40 to 60 million years ago, is known landmasses that were inching across violent winds. During very strong in retrospect as the Tethys Sea. the Tethys Sea on their tectonic wind gusts of cyclonic storms, the Occupying tropical and subtropical plates. Frequent exposure to cyclones trunk of the coconut can be seen latitudes and being accessible to would have favoured the evolution bent almost to the ground, with the great equatorial Pacific Ocean of many of the wild coconut palm’s a hardy narrow cluster of vertical current, this vast body of water is critical traits. fronds resisting the wind while the lower fronds are whipped back and forth and finally detached. is has the ‘clever’ side-effect of easing the pressure on the palm trunk as the crown size diminishes. During the normal growth of a mature palm, the younger fronds push the old fronds outwards at the base, weakening their attachment to the trunk and preparing them to be shed progressively under the stress of a persistent buffeting wind. e overall force of the wind on the palm is reduced as outer fronds are broken away, leaving the central core of fronds to ride out the storm. is reduces the risk of fatal damage to the solitary bud concealed at the Figure 1-1. Notional position of land fragments (dark brown) around the Tethys centre of the palm crown. sea 40 million years before present (BP) in relation to the present position of e fruit of the wild coconut palm those lands (dotted outlines). e great westward-flowing warm equatorial floats remarkably well because of current of the tropical Pacific ocean flowed, in that bygone geological era, its thick, low-density husk, which into the Tethys Sea, unobstructed by the islands of Papua New Guinea and absorbs water very slowly. Fruits Indonesia which now divert its flow into both the north and south Pacific.

17 can float for up to four months to support early growth. Remember sufficient kernel (hundreds of grams, on the ocean and still germinate that the structure that gave it in fact) to sustain growth until when placed on dry land. Trials in buoyancy must now be overcome the roots reach sweet water deep both Hawaii and Solomon Islands by emerging roots forcing their way beneath the sand, and until there are have been conducted in which through to get a hold on the soil, and five or six young fronds to capture the fruits were floated in cages by an upthrusting shoot that needs enough solar energy to become constructed in calm harbours. Nuts to emerge beyond the husk before it independent of the seed’s reserve. were transferred to the nursery at unfolds its first leaf. In some ways, this resembles the intervals, to await germination. Even reproductive strategy of placental So precarious is the perch of the after 120 days floating in the sea, mammals, which nourish their coconut thrown ashore by the ocean, some seeds germinated. young first in the womb and then that it has evolved a large seed from a milk supply after birth. Besides acting as a buoyant within its outer husk, containing container for the coconut seed, the husk is soft enough to cushion the seed inside when it falls onto a rocky spot, but still hard enough to injure any creature, large or small, unlucky enough to stray into its ‘flight path’. e evolution of the palm’s hardy floating seed, able to survive months at sea and travel up to many thousands of kilometres depending on the speed of the current, guaranteed the coconut’s wide dispersal. Other adaptations allowed it to sprout in its new home. Imagine the seed arriving, eventually, on a remote shore, pushed up onto a sandy or gravelly spot, perhaps within reach of the king tide—a precarious and Figure 1-2. Lower fronds of mature Tall coconut palms being severely flexed by harsh environment. Its survival the wind during a cyclone, while the vertical cluster of upper fronds remains now depends upon the reserve of firm. Loss of lower fronds in such wind increases the chance of the palm kernel (endosperm) that it carries weathering the storm.

18 In this way, the coconut palm material via drifting fruit, as a number (central stalk), are whipped around evolved into a well-adapted, widely of hospitable shorelines edged their and twisted furiously by the wind, distributed plant, dwelling on the way through the tropical seas. they cannot ‘self-prune’ because coastlines of hundreds of islands of their unyielding attachment In clear contrast to the coconut, and some continents. Fossils, likely to the trunk. As was observed on the oil palm (Elaeis guineensis) is a to be ancestral coconut forms, have Guadalcanal (Solomon Islands) forest-dwelling species with a crown been found in both South America following Cyclone Namu in 1986, attached to a stout but inflexible and New Zealand. However, there the oil palm’s central cluster of trunk, which is shorter and thicker is a compelling case that the modern fronds can be fatally damaged by than that of the coconut palm. coconut evolved ‘on the move’, taking cyclonic wind, while neighbouring When longer fronds of the oil palm, parallel courses in several locations coconut palms are left unscathed which have a greater density of and occasionally exchanging genetic (Figure 1-3). leaflets and a more slender rachis Friendship with a crab A species of crab (Birgus latro), known simply as the ‘coconut crab’, has long thrived on a coconut- enriched diet and has evolved some deft abilities to get at the nourishing kernel. is crab is reputed to be able to climb the coconut palm, pull the fruit loose, strip off the husk and, with its giant claws, gain entry to the nut by smashing a hole in the shell. e crab is common in many coconut habitats but there is so far no documentary evidence that it can help itself to a coconut meal as easily as the legend claims. e coconut crab’s claw is certainly the right shape to be inserted through a 40- mm diameter hole and to scoop out Figure 1-3. Crown of an oil-palm (at right) on Guadalcanal with the central the oil-rich kernel. ere is no doubt growing point fatally damaged by cyclone Namu in 1986. Coconut palms that the crab often eats coconut growing nearby were undamaged.

19 kernel, perhaps in some cases by e coconut crab inhabits the three Coconut diversity and the attacking seedlings whose somewhat great archipelagos of the Philippines, human factor weathered husk can be easily ripped Indonesia and Melanesia—which off to get to the nut. together might be described as the In the ancient coconut heartland, ‘coconut heartland’. e apparent variations in the size and shape of e coconut crab is often found coevolution of crab and coconut the wild coconut palm and its fruit with a great reserve of coconut- has been found to be less complete were unlikely because the basic flavoured fat in its tail. is is prized than once believed, however, as the functional traits of the palm had as a delicious high-energy food by crab can subsist in places where already evolved. e palm’s natural indigenous peoples in Melanesia, for the coconut is not readily available. home was the strand, the strip of example, and offered to tourists as a For example, the crab is also found sandy soil on the coastline, and it gourmet dish at some resorts. As the in outlying islands as far north as was already well adapted to this fat is reputed to be chemically very Okinawa (south of Japan in latitude environment. similar to coconut oil, it is a healthy 25 degrees north), where the coconut addition to any diet. is present but not widespread. But there are other, invisible, traits that are important to the palm’s survival in various areas. Physiological adaptations to the physical environment (such as seasonally cool periods, drought and different soil traits) and the biotic environment (diseases and pests) would have evolved as responses to the varying latitudes, rainfall zones, and plants, insects and pathogens close enough to the strand to affect the coconut.

Genetic diversity is generally a good indicator of a plant species’ prolonged presence in a region— diversity is greatest where the species has been longest—but this rule does Figure 1-4. e coconut crab, showing its very powerful claws used to tear the not apply in trying to understand husk from the fruit and gouge out the kernel through a hole it has the power to the coconut’s evolution. e coconut make in the coconut shell. (C. Schiller) must grow within the reach of king

20 Figure 1-5. Zones of latitude within which any regions of moist coastal environment support the growth of the coconut. Zones 1, 2 and 3 support high, medium and low potential productivity, respectively. e fall in productivity relates to the duration of the cool season which is nil in zone 1 and 6 months at the extreme of zone 3. tides and tidal surges generated by However, many of these variations As well as selecting coconut palms cyclonic winds, or, more rarely, a reflect not natural selection but that bear large fruit with thin husks, few hundred metres further inland, humans’ attempts to improve increasing the amount of edible where its seed has been carried by a on nature. Producers have bred kernel per fruit, producers have tsunami (or ‘tidal wave’). coconuts for pleasure and for profit, cultivated Dwarf varieties, which increasing the value of the coconut are easier to harvest (the other main Nowadays, there are many shape to their economies. ey have variety is, of course, referred to as the and size variations in the modern selected fruit for its attractive colour Tall). ere are also some varieties coconut palm. e palm shows and thinner husk (with a consequent that bear fruit earlier than others, diversity in tallness and in its rate of increase in the proportion of water another characteristic of the Dwarf increase in height, in the shape and and kernel), and for increased nut and of certain Talls. thickness of its trunk, the robustness diameter (see Figures 1-6 and 1-7). of its crown, and the size, shape e original colonisers of Polynesia A large nut contains two to three and colour of its fruit. e colour took coconuts, possessing some of times more water and kernel than of the fruit ranges from dark brown these ‘domestic’ traits, to the fringes a small nut, and a palm producing through light brown to light and of the coconut’s natural range. fruit with thin husks produces a dark green, orange and yellow. Evidence suggests that, 4000 years great deal more water and kernel ago, colonising mariners began from every bunch. moving eastwards from the coast of

21 South-East Asia to the islands of who probably originated in Borneo the South Pacific, extending 10 000 (according to linguistic evidence), kilometres from New Guinea to took the coconut with them across Tahiti. ey carried coconut fruits the Indian Ocean to Madagascar, for food and drink on the voyage and from where it journeyed on to East to plant in their new homes. Africa. e coconut populations in the regions around the Indian Perhaps such voyagers are also Ocean were, until recently, much less responsible for the coconut-based diverse in palm and nut characters menu of southern India and Sri than those of the coconut heartland Lanka. More than 2000 years ago, and of Polynesia. It seems likely that the coconut spread westwards from the ancestors of the Polynesians its heartland to the coasts of the Figure 1-6. Wild-type coconut fruit. had been using the coconut—and subcontinent, carried by traders e thick husk give buoyancy and modifying it by selection—for returning home from the islands protection against mechanical countless millennia before they that now form part of Indonesia. shock upon falling from the palm. began their great voyages. Just why Perhaps, in that same era, people (Brian Leach) they set out on such voyages is not clear, but probably there was pressure to escape invaders from North Asia.

Completing the equatorial circle In more recent times, Portuguese mariners, beginning with Vasco da Gama in 1498, took the coconut from India and East Africa to the tropical eastern Atlantic. From the Portuguese stronghold on the Cape Verde Islands (off the coast of Senegal in West Africa), coconuts were taken in two directions. Westwards, they were a source of Figure 1-7. Domestic-type coconut fruit. e result of human selection, such food and drink on slave-trading fruit has less husk and a greater proportion of consumable water and kernel.

22 ships bound for Cuba and other Australia’s coconut story: e journals from the voyages of islands, with those fruits remaining a remarkable absence in the Dutch ships Hormuzeer and on arrival being planted in the New precolonial times Chesterfield in Torres Strait in 1693, World as a foundation food source. and that of William Dampier, who Eastwards, they were dispersed from followed the north-west coast of Although the coconut was to be the Cape Verde Islands to the coast Western Australia in 1688 and found on tropical coasts worldwide of West Africa, from Senegal all the 1699, do not mention the coconut before European settlers came to way to Angola. among mainland vegetation—yet Australia in the late 18th century, the Dutch reported large numbers Before these events in the early 16th it was, remarkably, absent from the of coconut palms on several of the century, the coconut was foreign tropical coasts of the continent. e Torres Strait Islands. to the indigenous people of West reasons for this are still debated, Africa, many of whom used the especially because the coconut has In 1770, Captain James Cook named local oil palm of the forest as a major become widespread and successful Palm Island (near Townsville) food source. e ease of planting since European settlement began. after mistakenly believing he saw and management of the much- In many locations on the north- coconut palms through his telescope. travelled and adaptable coconut east coast of Queensland, obscure Investigation showed that the palms palm led within a few decades to its groves thrive without any human were not coconut, but a species of the widespread dispersal in the islands management, indicating that the genus Livistona, which he referred to of the Caribbean, on the Caribbean environment of the tropical coast, as a ‘cabbage’ palm. is name arises coast of Mexico and Central and at least, is hospitable. ese groves from the use of the heart of Livistona South America, and along the were probably all initiated with palms as food in dire emergency. coast of West Africa. As coconut deliberate plantings, but their palms were already growing on the extension might include some Neither Cook nor Matthew Flinders Pacific coast of Central America natural dispersal of seeds. (who circumnavigated the continent and on some nearby islands before in 1801–03), reported other the ‘discovery’ of those places by e early European mariners sightings of coconut palms, despite European mariners, the plantings in in the Pacific were very ‘coconut their scrutiny of many parts of the the Caribbean actually completed, in conscious’, having been introduced north Australian coast. Flinders did, the 16th century, the coconut palm’s to the practice of carrying stocks of however, record seeing a piece of encirclement of the globe. It thereby coconuts for food by the indigenous ‘fresh’ coconut shell on Aken Island, became, and it remains, the most peoples of tropical islands and three kilometres off the central widespread and widely used palm in southern India. ere is, however, Queensland coast in south-western the world. not one precolonial mariner who Shoalwater Bay. Perhaps it had been refers in his journal to coconuts discarded by an Aborigine who had on the Australian mainland coast. opened a nut that drifted ashore.

23 Were Aborigines coast, as there are specific words for consumers but not the fruit in local languages: around growers? Cooktown the coconut is keremande and at Mackay it is cooreemboola. ere has been much speculation by naturalists as to why the coconut e scourge of a native rat was absent from the Australian mainland. e palm and its products A white-tailed rat (Uromys were prominent in the life of the caudimaculatus) might have been Melanesian and other peoples of another player competing for the the nearby region—including the prized meal of a coconut fruit eastern islands of Indonesia—as well washed up on an Australian beach. as in Papua New Guinea and the is animal of the north-east Figure 1-8. Mature fruits opened by Torres Strait Islands. coast, the male of which sometimes weighs 1.5 kilograms, is equipped the white-tailed rat of north-eastern It is reported that coconut fruits with very strong, sharp teeth and Australia. were traded between Torres Strait can easily gnaw its way through a islanders and the Aborigines of coconut’s husk and shell to reach the northern Cape York Peninsula. Why, kernel. e rat shows interest only then, were there no productive palms in mature fruits, either on the palm in Australia? Could it be that the or on the ground (as opposed to the traditional Aborigines, who mainly feral rats that have invaded most hunted and gathered their food and coconut habitats and prefer to forage did not cultivate food plants, were on immature fruits). unaware of the potential of the It seems likely that the consumption traded or gathered fruit to grow into of coconut seeds by Aboriginal a bountiful palm? people and foraging white-tailed Figure 1-9. e white-tailed rat I am convinced that a hungry forager rats would have kept the beaches of (Uromys caudimaculata) showing would consume a nut washed up on northern Australia clear of coconut the distinctive white colour at the tip the beach, thankful for the ease of palms. Even a young seedling up of its tail. (Queensland Museum) harvesting it, and thereby thwart its to one year old would still yield a potential growth into a palm. ere quick meal for human or rodent is no doubt that coconut fruit was from its residual kernel and spongy familiar to the Aborigines along ‘apple’. e ‘apple’ is an organ that much of the north Queensland grows to fill the space inside the nut

24 as the seedling develops. It secretes Coping with sea-level rise traditions. Farming peoples of the enzymes that break down the kernel coconut heartlands, on the other to a liquid form that is absorbed e coconut’s colonisation of hand, would surely have replanted to provide energy to the growing northern Australian beaches the coconut further inland in plant attached to the nut. Eventually could also have been stalled by a response to the advancing ocean. all the kernel is consumed by the more insidious, long-term factor, During this period, the Great seedling in this way (see Chapter more important in Australia than Barrier Reef developed parallel to 3). e seedling would be destroyed elsewhere because the native people the north-east coast of Australia when the nut was opened. were not cultivators. at factor was climate change. and in the zone that was once dry land, the coral colonies grew to keep Loss of coconut seedlings Following the last ice age, which was pace with the rising sea level. e and older palms at its most intense around 20 000 reef became a kind of shield against years ago, the sea level rose gradually ocean-borne objects, such as coconut e white-tailed rat and some by about 140 metres. e sea level seeds, which would have tended to foraging birds, such as the swamp peaked at approximately one metre be washed up on inhospitable coral hen, are able to chew through the above its present level about 6000 cays and sandbars that were too base of the outer fronds of a robust years ago. During those 14 000 years small to develop a vital ‘lens’ of fresh seedling to get to the tender tissue of rising seas, the coastline of north- water above the saline water table. of the growing bud. Because there eastern Australia was relocated, Rarely would seeds have reached is only one vegetative bud in the bit by bit, from a position that was the distant coastline of the main coconut, such an attack is fatal. In the originally an average of almost landmass. case several native Australian palm 100 kilometres further east than species, such as the Livistona group its modern location. e coconut Coastal explorers in (the cabbage palms), it was common palm may well have colonised the Australia for traditional Aborigines to harvest outlying northern coast from time the succulent growing bud, known as to time, but successive palm colonies Whereas mariners like Dampier, ‘heart of palm’, from the centre of the would have been drowned as the sea Cook and Flinders did not report crown of older trees. Any coconut level rose inexorably at an average sighting any coconut palms, palm that had escaped the attention rate of 10 metres per millennium. sightings were reported in the of food gatherers, swamp hens or If indigenous hunters and gatherers mid-19th century by explorers rats long enough to grow to maturity, were active on that coast during that looking more closely at parts of the perhaps due to its isolation, would time, it is unlikely that they would Queensland coast. most likely have been harvested for have assisted the coconut to survive, heart of palm when it was eventually since propagating or protecting discovered by the local people. static crops was not part of their

25 In June 1848, Captain J. MacGillivray Dalrymple, in 1868, noted that there Planting by Australian of the survey ship Rattlesnake noted was a palm at Tam O’Shanter Point colonists two clumps, each of several tall and on Rockingham Bay and another fruitful palms, on Russell Island, at the mouth of Trebourne (Palm) In the late 19th century, soon after the southernmost of the Frankland Creek on Halifax Bay. An 1866 overland telegraph from Cairns to the Islands south-east of Cairns. In drawing of the bay at Somerset tip of Cape York was built, coconut 1864, an old, isolated palm with an (10 kilometres south-east of the tip palms were planted in clearings near estimated height of 14 metres was of Cape York Peninsula) shows two the line’s repeater stations. Palms recorded by the botanist A. ozet at coconut palms that appear to be 20 were also planted near homesteads Cawarral Creek, south of the modern years old, a sign of possible planting on the developing cattle stations small town of Emu Park (latitude by an early trader based in the region. in the region. Besides the obvious 23 degrees south) on the central ere is again the possibility, however, ornamental attraction of coconut Queensland coast. that seaborne seeds had survived as palms, these plantings were part of the Aborigines gave up traditional a government policy of providing Later sightings in the mid-19th ways in response to contact with an emergency food supply for the century were of palms that could European visitors and settlers. occupants of these isolated outposts. possibly have been planted by passing mariners. On the other Absence of coconut palms from Early in the 20th century, many hand, once the dispossession of the west coast of the Gulf of coconut plantations, albeit small local Aboriginal tribes had begun by Carpentaria and the north coast of ones compared to those in the South the mid-19th century, their regular the Northern Territory (known as Pacific islands, were established on the visiting of the beaches may have Arnhem Land) and areas further North Queensland coast between the declined, increasing the probability west might not have depended upon Daintree and Johnstone rivers (latitudes that arriving coconut seeds would Aboriginal gathering or foraging by 16–17.5 degrees south). In 1911, be left to germinate and survive, rats. e rapid ocean current that an adventurer named Jack McLaren especially in areas outside of the flows through Torres Strait from began establishing a small plantation habitat of the white-tailed rat. east to west, which made passage on Simpson’s Bay, a few kilometres through this extremely shallow south-west of the tip of Cape York. In 1871, while exploring the coast strait so difficult for Torres in 1606 At the same time, government agent around the estuary of the Herbert and Cook in 1770, would probably and trader Frank Jardine planted River, the explorers and sugar prevent floating coconut fruits from some thousands of palms at Somerset pioneers, brothers Arthur and drifting to shores south of their on the nearby east coast. Christian Frank Neame, reported finding two dictated course. missionaries encouraged Aboriginal productive and tall palms. George communities at Mapoon and other settlements on the west coast of the Cape to plant coconuts for food.

26 But there was another motive. During tourist resorts throughout coastal by the writings of authors such World War I (1914–1918), coconut northern Australia. It has become as Robert Louis Stevenson, who oil was sold to the armaments industry the ubiquitous symbol of holidays took up residence in Samoa in the for the production of glycerine. In and relaxation, evoking thoughts of a South Pacific. His description of the common with most vegetable oils, warm environment, languid waters, apparently carefree lifestyle of the coconut oil is made up of molecules romance and generous banquets. indigenous people of this Polynesian known as triglycerides, which comprise island had great appeal. e paintings e ‘escape’ image of the coconut a glycerine molecule and three fatty of Gauguin, working in Tahiti, added seems to have evolved in Europe acid attachments, of which there are a to the myth of coconut cultures in an because of the contrast between the dozen or more varieties. Pure glycerine environment of plenty, where no-one coconut’s lush tropical environment is obtained by chemically separating needed to be stressed in the course of and the industrial cityscapes of the fatty acids. Further processing survival, and where the inhabitants so many European cities in the transforms the glycerine to the were universally welcoming of visitors 19th and early 20th centuries. e powerful explosive, nitroglycerine. who came to share their paradise. power of this image was heightened e high postwar cost of labour and the economic depression of 11 1929–35 meant that these early ° Darwin Bamega plantations were not commercially viable for long. Australian coconut Broome Katherine 17° Cairns plantations were not the only ones to suffer, as the depression undermined the profitability of Rockhampton 24° coconut plantations worldwide.

e coconut redeployed Geraldton 29° Byron Bay in an ornamental role Isolated remnants of some of the early coconut enterprises of European Australians remain, even to this day. But the coconut began to fill a new and completely different role in the later part of the 20th Figure 1-10. Distribution of the coconut palm around the 20 000 km northern century, as an ornamental palm to coast-line of the Australian mainland, extending south to the 29th parallel of beautify parks, streetscapes and latitude on both the east and the west coasts.

27 Another popular image among ere are now many tens of latitudes, the temperature is known Europeans was the ‘desert island’ thousands of coconut palms, to decline, on average, 0.6°C for each inhabited by a lone marooned person scattered along 20 000 kilometres of 100-metre increase in altitude. If and a coconut palm, suggesting that coastline from Geraldton (latitude the mean temperature at sea level the person was provided for by fruit 29 degrees south) in Western is 27°C, which is not uncommon falling from the palm. Australia, through the towns of the on tropical coastlines, on adjacent north-west coast (although much of highlands at 1000 metres it will be that coastline is too hot and arid), close to 21°C—the approximate Darwin, Arnhem Land, the islands limit for reproductive growth of the and coast of the Gulf of Carpentaria, coconut. At the higher altitude, the and in pockets all the way down the palm may survive and be capable of east coast from the tip of Cape York growing fronds, but not fruit. to Cape Byron (spanning latitudes Latitude and seasonal temperature 11–29 degrees). is spread of also play a part. Although the palm distribution, lying outside the grows attractively on the coast in equatorial zone (zone 1 in Figure latitudes as high as 29 degrees, it 1-5) has enabled observation of the rarely retains fruit beyond the early effects on coconut palm growth of developmental stage in latitudes substantial variations in seasonal beyond 24 degrees. is fact cool temperatures (see Figure 1-13 frequently gives rise to the question, and Chapter 3). ‘Why are there no fruit when the palms look quite healthy?’ Fruit What are the will fail to set if the inflorescence environmental limits for (the flower stalk) does not develop the coconut? properly and, as most kinds of palm need cross-pollination to Little information has been gathered Figure 1-11. An ancient palm at produce fruit, isolated palms are about the effect of temperature Mapoon on the east coast of disadvantaged. e exception is the on the fruit development of the the Gulf of Carpentaria, Australia Dwarf palm, which is able to self- coconut, although there have been – 24 m tall and around 100 years old. pollinate. Failure can also be induced descriptions of the effect of severe It was the last survivor (year 2000) by three to four months of mean drought on fruit growth in Africa. of hundreds planted by missionaries temperatures below 21°C, too low in the late 1800s with a view to Altitude and temperature combined for the palm to achieve the vigour of securing a source of food for the can limit the range of the coconut growth needed for fruit development. local aboriginal tribes. palm. In tropical and subtropical

28 Figure 1-12. Four seasonal mean temperature distribution maps of Australia. Even during winter the entire north coast, and the east coast as far south as Cooktown have an average temperature above 21 degrees, enabling the palm to grow quite well year round in that zone. e southern limit of coconut survival corresponds closely to the position of the 21 degree isotherm in spring and autumn. e map coloured bright red shows those areas where the mean maximum temperature exceeds 36 degrees during both spring and summer. is identifies areas where the coconut would experience damaging stress even when cared for with regular watering. (Based on data of the Bureau of Meteorology, Australia.)

29 e coconut fruit requires a year- public places must invest in pruning annual mean temperature in these long period, during which the palm (denutting) or bunch-caging services locations, and some others, has is free from severe stress, to grow to to eliminate the risk. been graphed in Figure 1-14. A maturity. prolonged cool period appears to South of Mackay, on the Australian induce narrowing of the nut within Natural fruit loss because of cold east coast (around latitude the fruit, giving it an elongated weather or water stress is a boon for 20 degrees south), the fruit reaches appearance, with some fruit also city councils and other organisations full maturity but a small proportion showing incomplete development managing coconut palms in urban may have incomplete kernel of the kernel. In places where settings. ey would normally spend development. is renders the nut there is little seasonal variation much money removing the fruit so incapable of germinating, although in temperature, for example near that passers-by are not endangered the kernel is still good to eat. North the tip of Cape York (latitude 11 by falling mature nuts (see Chapter of that latitude, most fruits contain degrees south), the typical rounded 6), which usually weigh more than a fully developed kernel and have nut shape predominates. In the one kilogram at maturity. Palms can potential value as seeds and as a coconut heartlands of Indonesia, grow up to 30 metres, but even a reliable source of food and drink. the Philippines and Melanesia, nut five-metre drop would cause serious Figure 1-13 shows the shapes of shapes vary from spherical to oval injury. Tall palms become hazardous coconut shells in fruit grown in or almost cone shaped; the shape very soon after fruiting begins. various places in Australia. e found in seasonally cool regions ose responsible for palms in seems always to be elongated or a narrow oval. Shape is not an issue in the marketplace, provided that the kernel is sound, but a narrow nut has a smaller volume and therefore less value than a spherical nut.

Extreme latitude: the coconut seedling as an indoor plant

I was once astonished to find Figure 1-13. Fruit and nut shapes that have been affected by different seasonal coconut seedlings growing in temperature ranges. Elliott Heads (latitude 25 degrees) is midway between the dining room of a hotel in Brisbane and Rockhampton, Seaforth is close to Mackay (latitude 21 degrees) while Pitlochry, Scotland (latitude 57 Cooktown (latitude 15 degrees 30) is on the east coast of Cape York Peninsula. degrees north). Although it was

30 midwinter, the central heating kept the reserves will be exhausted and Can the coconut palm the temperature around 21°C, growth will cease unless there is be regarded as a native which was sufficiently warm to enough light for photosynthesis. Australian plant? support active growth. e nutrient Ornamental coconut seedlings for and energy reserves of the kernel indoor use are distributed widely by From time to time in Australia, are capable of supporting growth nurseries in the Netherlands, and the question of the coconut’s well beyond 12 months in this very probably in other temperate indigenous or ‘naturalised’ status is environment. Eventually, however, countries. raised, especially in relation to the management of coastal national 32 parks. e coconut was very scarce Brisbane Cairns Mackay indeed when the European colonists Darwin Townsville Minimum line 29 arrived, but it was not entirely absent, as shown above. It is obvious 26 to anyone who walks the beaches,

e (°C) particularly of the east coast, that ur

at 23 coconut seeds arrive fairly frequently, er and that some of these seeds are mp capable of establishing palms. eir

Te 20 21°C–Minimum limiting growth arrival is not surprising, because 17 the dominant ocean current off the Queensland coast flows through the 14 islands to the east of Papua New r r t y c v g n Guinea, where the coconut grows pt Ja July Feb Ap Oc De Au Ma No June Ma Se prolifically. e Australian coast Months shares many other species of strand plants with Melanesia, such as the Figure 1-14. Annual daily mean temperature graph for some Australian casuarina (or ‘sheoak’), the goats-foot centres of different latitude. Brisbane is marginal for coconut, having a mean morning glory, and the leguminous temperature below the 21 degrees critical value for about six months. Fruit creeper Vigna marina. always drops before reaching maturity in Brisbane. In Mackay, where the cool season is shorter and less intense, fruit is able to mature successfully. is is the It seems clear to me that, but for southern limit of consistent production of sound fruit though a proportion of the presence of Aboriginal food- good fruit is produced as far south as Bundaberg. Cairns has a short period close gatherers and the foraging white- to 21 deg, while in Darwin the daily mean temperature is close to the ideal of 28 tailed rat, the coconut would have degrees for six months and only slightly below for the remainder of the year. been well established on at least the

31 most favourable tropical shores of the Australian north-east before European settlement. It is a potential coloniser of the Australian coast, and quite possibly has established itself on some northern beaches since the dislocation of the Aboriginal tribes, and perhaps also the local decline in numbers of the white-tailed rat, during the 19th century. ere is no clear proof either way about its establishment during that time, but given the palm’s known tenacity in colonising remote strands, and some circumstantial evidence that it actually did so on the Australian coast, I suggest that it be accepted as a native Australian plant. e coconut palm’s ‘native’ Figure 1-15. e author holding habitat is a very restricted niche on an ornamental coconut seedling the strand. It cannot establish itself indoors at Pitlochry in Scotland. naturally anywhere else, because After one year or so, when the dispersal is solely by water—which supply of kernel supporting growth is counters any argument for its exhausted, indoor palms die due to acceptance in natural heritage areas lack of sufficient sunlight. away from the strand.

32 chapter 2 Surprising diversity among coconuts adaptations to new environments and to human demands

e two main groups of the coconut palm are the Talls and the Dwarfs. e Tall group contains much diversity, in spite of its origins on the narrow strand, and includes scores of varieties recognised globally and many that have not yet been classified. ere are great differences in the thickness, shape and rate of growth of the trunk; the length of frond of the mature palm; the colour, shape, size and flavour of fruit; adaptation of the palm’s growth to physical variables, particularly nutrient supply, seasonal temperature cycles and water deficit (drought); and tolerance to damage by some pests and diseases. Tall and Dwarf palms show great physical contrast, and are usually separated by village people for convenience: the Dwarf is found close to settlements because it is more ornamental and more accessible as a source of coconut juice.

33 How many varieties of no two Tall palms have the same at any age is inclined to snap in coconut are there? genetic makeup, even though their severe cyclonic wind, and its small ancestors might have been confined circumference at the base makes it Despite the first impressions of for generations to the same small vulnerable to breakage of the root visitors to coconut country, not island or beachfront. attachments. e broader base of the all coconut palms look alike. e Tall carries more roots and suffers coconut ‘kingdom’ is divided into Apart from usually small differences less ‘leverage’ force when the upper two main groups, called ‘Talls’ and in appearance (fruit size, shape and trunk is flexed sideways. e only ‘Dwarfs’. ere is a great deal of colour; trunk thickness; length advantages of Dwarfs over Talls, variation in fruit colour and size of fronds etc.) between all the in the matter of survival, are their within these two groups, but usually members of a group of Tall palms, earlier fruiting and higher number of the Tall has a thicker trunk, a larger their different gene combinations fruit per bunch. crown and larger fruit. influence their adaptation to the environment. If the group It is common practice to refer to Talls mostly cross-breed, while experiences an attack by a disease a Tall population according to its Dwarfs mostly inbreed. One result organism, for example, some location, either regional (such as of this difference in breeding members might cope better with the West Coast Tall, from the western behaviour is that a group of disease because of their particular coastline of southern India) or, in Talls might appear fairly ‘mixed’, combinations of genes. While those the case of small countries, by the particularly in the diverse shapes and members will continue to produce country’s name (such as Solomon colours of the fruit. Cross-breeding, seeds, natural selection will work Islands Tall). Palms will have or outbreeding as it is sometimes against the others. Eventually, the become adapted to the particular called, is the consequence of the surviving descendants of the group ecological conditions of the place, male and female flowers on each will be more likely to carry the such as climate, soil and biological flowering branch (inflorescence) effective combinations of genes and influences, and especially insect being active at different times (see cope with the particular disease. and disease pressure. is applies Chapter 3 for a full description of particularly in south and south-east flowering). e female flowers are A group or family of Dwarfs, on Asia and the Pacific islands, where mostly fertilised by pollen from the other hand, shows very little adaptation has come about through other nearby palms, but sometimes variation and does not adapt as natural selection acting upon the durable, waxy, coconut pollen well to a changing environment. hundreds of generations of palms. A can be carried many kilometres by Dwarfs are physically less robust group of Tall palms associated with insects or wind before it reaches a than Talls (Figure 2-1) and do not a location in this way is referred to as receptive flower. e diversity, or acquire the flexibility that enables a variety or ‘ecotype’. heterozygosity, arising from this high older Tall palms to yield to the wind frequency of crossing means that without breaking. e Dwarf trunk

34 Dwarfs have far fewer varieties Dwarf varieties usually refer to the e Dwarf palm does not develop a than Talls, both because of their country or region of origin and the bole or enlarged base on the trunk, inbreeding and because their seeds colour, such as Sri Lanka Green, as most Tall varieties do. e Dwarf cannot survive a long period floating Nias Orange, Malayan Yellow and trunk has very nearly the same on the ocean. is inability stems New Guinea Brown (see Figure 2-2). diameter at ground level as it does from the characteristically thin husk along its full length, except for very of the Dwarf nut, which acts against Telling the difference slight tapering as it gains height. the preservation of the seed within. between a Tall and a Dwarf palms are of course much shorter than Talls of the same age Dwarfs are regarded as the likely Dwarf palm (less than half the trunk height), result of mutations that made e differences in trunk thickness and their shorter fronds result in a female flowers ready for pollination and the size of the crown allow smaller crown. e Dwarf begins to whilst the male flowers of the same almost instant recognition of a palm flower and bear fruit two or three inflorescence were releasing their as Tall or Dwarf, except for hybrids years earlier than the Tall (from pollen, resulting in a high frequency of the two, which are intermediate in the age of three years under really of self-pollination. e names of trunk thickness (see Figure 2-1). favourable conditions), and because its trunk extends only slowly, fruit bunches are carried close to the ground at first and remain within reach of the human hand for several years.

Talls, on the other hand, usually bear their first bunches out of reach, and they rapidly grow to a height at which harvesting requires a long- handled cutting tool, an extension ladder or climbing skills.

Within the Tall group, it is fairly easy to recognise two major subgroups on the basis of size and shape of the fruits. A large, roundish Figure 2-1. Contrasting thickness and shape of the base of the trunk of a Tall fruit having a thinner husk is (left), a Dwarf (right), and an intermediate hybrid, type of palm — all three referred to as the ‘domesticated’ form adjusted to the same scale. (Figure 2-3, right). It has evolved as

35 Figure 2-2. Four common fruit colours, light brown, orange, yellow and pale green, found especially on Dwarf palms. Many other shades of green and brown are found on Tall fruit but the recessive orange and yellow colours shown here are almost exclusive to Dwarf palms, which display the same colours on the frond petiole and also have pale leaflets. (Roland Bourdeix, Centre for International Cooperation in Agricultural Research for Development (CIRAD), France) a result of selection by humans over showing great diversity between Drought tolerance many millennia for greater water palms, are found in many coconut content, providing a convenient populations. is is especially so on Apart from their recognisable fruit water supply for drinking where some of the long-occupied Pacific characters (size, shape, dominant fresh water is scarce, especially on islands, indicating that an original colour), different Tall populations sea voyages. wild coconut palm population, can also be distinguished, when which predated the arrival of human compared within a location, through e ‘wild’ form of the Tall coconut, colonisers, has been blending for their differences in adaptation. on the other hand, is found wherever some time with introduced larger- the palm has spread naturally, Environmental variables (such fruited varieties. and has remained genetically as the regular occurrence of a unchanged in its proportions of A few very remote islands, such as dry season, seasonal variations in husk and nut. e wild-type fruit North Keeling in the Cocos Islands temperature, or attacks by pest and is smaller than the domesticated of the Indian Ocean, show truly disease organisms) induce tolerance fruit and has a higher proportion wild-type fruit with no trace of through natural selection. For of husk, which enables it to float introduced forms. example, coconut palms from Kerala, on the ocean for a long time, and a in south-west India where the dry correspondingly lower volume of season is pronounced, withstand nut-water. Intermediate-sized fruits, the seasonal drought well at home.

36 ey are also notably better adapted air that moves in from mainland Tall palm can grow tall enough to than palms from South-East Asia China. Exotic varieties, on the other survive spasmodic frosts, because its or the South Pacific when these are hand, are severely damaged or killed increase in height raises its fronds all compared, regardless of whether by such weather. and growing point above the level of they are grown in India or in other the layer of freezing air. In subcoastal north-eastern seasonally dry environments, such as Australia, young palms succumb In Queensland, there are plenty of in parts of Africa and the Caribbean. to frost, which occurs rarely on healthy irrigated palms at Charters the northern Atherton Tableland Tolerance of low Towers (latitude 19 degrees (latitude 16 degrees south, altitude south, 130 kilometres inland), for temperature 400 metres) and with increasing example, and an isolated healthy Hainan Island, off southern China frequency at inland locations 30-year-old palm at Moura (latitude (latitude 19 degrees north), has progressively further south. If there 24.5 degrees, 180 kilometres inland). a pronounced cool season. e is not a fatal frost for five or six years South of Moura, the coconut does indigenous coconut population following germination, a young not survive inland. It would be very tolerates the spasmodic occurrence, interesting, however, to test the during the cool season, of short survival of the Hainan variety in such periods (a few days) of near-freezing areas of occasional overnight frost.

Tolerance of insect and disease attack Natural selection has led to the development, in Tall populations scattered around the coconut world, of resistance or tolerance to attack by particular insects or diseases. Many examples can be found of palms somewhat resistant to specific insects, such as the Melanesian coconut leaf beetle (Brontispa longissima), in Figure 2-3. Contrasting fruit size and Figure 2-4. A young Dwarf palm Papua New Guinea and Solomon proportion of husk and nut of wild killed by a rare frost on the Atherton Islands. is leaf-miner does little (left) and domesticated palms. e Tableland (latitude 17 degrees S., damage to young, adapted palms images have been adjusted to the altitude 400 m) in north-eastern growing in its habitat, but it can same scale. Australia be very destructive of young palms

37 brought from regions where it is other hand, had no tolerance and e palm planted elsewhere faces absent. e beetle can also be very began to succumb to the virus, later more threats. Its foliage is palatable destructive if it invades a new region. found to be confined to Vanuatu. not only to many insects but to all For example, a coconut variety e discovery was a blow to the herbivorous animals. Where the brought, because of its large fruit, research project because there had palm coexists with horses, cattle, from Malaya to Solomon Islands in been hopes of breeding new hybrids buffalo, sheep, goats or the like, the the 1920s suffered very severe damage for export to neighbouring countries, foliage must be protected for several from the local Brontispa beetle. but export was now too risky. years until it is out of their reach. Conversely, when the beetle entered Many nonselective pests—such Molecular tools show promise of Australia’s Cape York Peninsula as stick insects, locusts, the palm- becoming useful in the long term recently as a new arrival, it wreaked dart caterpillar, scale insects and in identifying, at moderate cost, extensive damage on coconuts and whitefly—inflict foliar damage on populations with tolerance to a some ornamental palms. coconut palms episodically, especially particular species or strain of attacker, in a monoculture (plantation) or to an environmental stress. is Coconut palms also exist that are situation (see Chapter 5). e soft approach might render unnecessary resistant or tolerant to bud rot and tissue of the central bud, particularly large field trials designed to compare lethal yellowing disease—both in the palm seedling, also attracts the tolerance of populations. Such serious scourges of coconuts in many creatures ranging from beetles, birds trials are costly and subject to parts of the world (see Chapter 4 and pigs to elephants! for a more detailed description of uncertainty about the intensity of diseases and pests of the palm). exposure to the hostile organism. Diversity among Dwarfs One of the most interesting e strand posed few ree main subgroups can examples of invisible tolerance to a biohazards conveniently be identified among disease was discovered in Vanuatu the Dwarfs: the ‘stumpy’ or compact during the 1960s, when many roughout its long evolution in its Dwarf of the South Pacific (named varieties of coconut were imported natural environment on the strand, Niu Leka or Niu Leha in Polynesian for research. Many of these exotic the coconut has not been exposed languages); the ‘village’ Dwarf, found coconut palms died, and local people to particularly strong selection scattered in villages throughout accused the researchers of importing pressure from pests and diseases. the Pacific; and the Malayan or a dangerous disease along with the is is because many small-island Nias Dwarf. e last two types palms. It turned out, however, that environments do not carry complex are fairly uniform, especially the there was a viral pathogen present populations of plants whose highly inbreeding (self-pollinating) in the local palms, which were so associated insects and pathogenic village Dwarf, whereas the stumpy tolerant of it that they showed no microorganisms would prey upon or Niu Leka is mostly an outbreeder. symptoms. Exotic varieties, on the invade neighbouring coconut palms.

38 e Niu Leka produces many orange (or yellow) fruit is a hybrid these genes is paired with a single intermediate forms by crossing with (from cross-pollination with a Tall). brown or green gene, the recessive the Tall, and with the village Dwarf. e orange colour is the product of orange and yellow colour genes are a recessive gene and is suppressed in not expressed because brown and e benchmark type of Niu Leka all the dominant green and brown green colours are dominant. is has a short, dense frond, resulting in variants of Tall palms. allows convenient identification of a very compact crown. e bunch both hybrid and Dwarf seedlings stem is also short, and the dominant e Malayan or Nias Dwarf emerging from Dwarf seed-nuts. If fruit colour is green. e trunk is of embraces a large group of variants, hybrid seedlings are being selected, similar thickness to that of the Tall long found in Indonesia (particularly green and brown colour on the but the rate of height increase is the on the island of Nias off Sumatra) petiole (leaf stalk) identifies them; slowest among coconut varieties, and in Malaysia, which have become if Dwarfs are sought, orange and allowing easy access to the fruit widespread and popular for various yellow petioles provide verification. from the ground for a longer period reasons. In contrast to the village than with other Dwarfs. e fruit is Dwarf with its tiny fruit, these have Some members of this third group medium-sized with moderately thick small to medium-sized fruit and a of Dwarfs have been used in husk, so the nut is fairly small. e more robust, though still distinctly plantations, particularly the Malayan Niu Leka tends to be low-yielding straight-sided lower trunk. e fruit orange, yellow and green cultivars. and has been used commercially is easily distinguished from that of However, they have less kernel per for copra-making only once (on Talls by size and colour, which might nut than Talls with similarly sized the Fijian island of Taveuni), but be dark to light green, dark to light nuts, and their kernel has a lower it provides a more easily harvested orange, yellow or brown. oil content and a less-developed source of drinking nuts than does a coconut flavour. Early fruit Tall of the same age. Most Dwarfs are up to 90% self- production, and the associated ease pollinating, with the principal of harvesting, are attractive traits in e village Dwarf has the thinnest exception of the thick-trunked the Dwarf, but its use in plantations trunk of all coconut varieties and ‘stumpy’ Niu Leka Dwarf. Dwarfs has not persisted. Small nuts are bears small orange fruit. Fruit can generally ‘breed true’ and retain more costly to process per unit of have a very light green colour when the fruit colour of the mother oil produced and the kernel is softer immature and darken to a definite (which is also the father) palm. that of the Tall, is harder to separate yellow before drying to brownish e orange and yellow colours are from the shell, and contains less oil. grey at maturity. e fruit of the each produced by a recessive gene, village Dwarf is small and elongated, and self-pollination allows these Some Dwarf populations in the and the mature nut is pear-shaped colours to be expressed because a Caribbean and Africa have shown and very small indeed. Any progeny ‘pure’ palm has two genes for the traits that are particularly interesting of a village Dwarf that does not bear colour. In palms in which either of for security of production, such

39 Diversity among palms native white-tailed rat population City Council, for ornamental use in introduced into Australia proliferated in response to the parks. Some may be found in the constant supply of unused fallen magnificent Townsville Palmetum As we have seen, Australia coconuts. in the suburb of Aitkenvale, along lacked significant numbers of with a great range of other palm coconut palms until the late 19th A few copra-type Tall palms were species. Interest in Dwarf varieties and early 20th centuries, when also planted in the late 19th century continues to increase, as managers of small investments were made in around Darwin, and on coastal holiday resorts, public parks and city plantations on the coast north mission stations in the Northern streetscapes become concerned about of the Johnstone River (which Territory and on the north-west liability for injury from any source, flows through Innisfail at latitude coast of Western Australia—for including falling coconut fruit. 17 degrees south), and at the tip of example, at the Catholic mission at Cape York (12 degrees south), using Kalumburu, and around Broome ‘copra’ palms of the type also being (latitude 18 degrees south). Many planted widely at the time in New seednuts, probably from Timor, were Guinea and the South Pacific islands imported to Darwin in the 1860s (copra is the kernel of the nut, dried in a vessel named the Gulnare, and to about 6% moisture content). there are records of imports from Seed for planting these areas would ailand and from the Federated probably have come from the Torres Malay States (now West Malaysia). Strait Islands and the Papuan coast In North Queensland during the and islands, where many trading 1970s, interest grew in the use of boats and trading posts were active yellow and orange small-fruited in that era. Dwarf palms as ornamentals in real Remnants of the Queensland estate developments and resorts, plantations remained until at least and on city streets. is is perhaps the 1980s, and an occasional very the first example in Australia of ancient palm (probably around a purely ornamental use of the 100 years old) can still be seen, coconut, although the palm had even though copra-making did not long been appreciated in holiday continue in Australia beyond the resorts for the way it helps to create depression of the 1930s. e old a relaxing, tropical ambience. In the Figure 2-5. Ancient palms at Wonga plantations continued to produce late 1990s, several distinct Dwarf Beach north of Cairns, Australia fruit that provided food for domestic varieties were introduced from (latitude 16 degrees 30 min S) and wild pigs. In some areas, the Solomon Islands by the Townsville planted in the early 20th century.

40 e Australian external territory of the Cocos–Keeling Islands, comprising one large and one small atoll, has a very interesting coconut history. Situated south-west of Java, these islands had already been colonised by the coconut palm when they were settled by a Scottish family early in the 19th century. Coconut plantations operated for 150 years. e plantations on Main Atoll, the larger of the islands, have been abandoned as a commercial enterprise and, while they meet the Figure 2-6. Aerial view of North Keeling atoll (latitude 12 degrees S, longitude 96 small needs of the few hundred degrees E), which is host to a ‘wild’ coconut woodland. descendants of the earlier labouring families, they have reverted to overcrowded coconut woodlands. ere seems never to have been any settlement on the smaller atoll, North Keeling, and this gives rise to the possibility that this island is home to the last truly wild-type coconut population in the world.

Figure 2-7. Coconut palms planted on a ‘high’ island overlooking coral reefs — typical of many coastlines of the south Pacific and Torres Strait. (Simon Foale)

41 as resistance to lethal yellowing ailand has a prized type, It is not yet known if they will disease and related pathogens. Aromatic Green Dwarf, with an sustain production throughout a Others show better tolerance of attractive aroma in the immature long life, as large-scale planting of drought, for example the Sri Lanka, husk. Keeping rats away from this hybrids began only in the 1970s, Cameroon and Brazil Green Dwarf variety is a problem, as it is with but in the first 20 years they have (a molecular study has shown ‘edible husk’ fruit found occasionally produced up to 30% more than the these to be very closely related). As in several countries. related Tall in the same environment. noted above, the fruit and nut of One theory proposes that the high ere are many reports of particular the Dwarf are smaller than those of yield of the hybrid is based in part palms producing fruit of exceptional the Tall used in plantations, which on its low rate of trunk growth, medicinal value, especially in their makes a larger-fruited Dwarf variant which allows more of the plant’s nut water (the coconut juice), but it more attractive. Unfortunately, two resources to be allocated to fruit is hard to find proof of such claims. otherwise suitable large-fruited production. Dwarf varieties, Malayan Green Exploiting diversity with Hybrids usually also have a higher and New Guinea Brown, have poor proportion of kernel in the fruit than drought tolerance. hybrids either parent does, because both the Other variations in both Dwarf Hybrids between Tall and Dwarf shell and the husk are thinner than and Tall palms include the non- types have attracted much interest those of the Tall parent, while the branching fruit bunch, or Spicata among producers seeking high nut is larger than that of the Dwarf type, which has a greatly reduced productivity, especially of kernel and parent. It is interesting to note number of male flowers, while oil. ese hybrids, for which the that the highest-yielding hybrids the female flowers are all crowded Tall parent has usually been chosen are those with a large number of on a single flower stem. In a rare because of its large fruit and local smallish fruit. type of palm in the Philippines, adaptation, grow more vigorously the Makapuno type, the kernel is and flower sooner than the Tall replaced by a gelatinous mass with parent. ey exhibit intermediate a strong coconut flavour; this type trunk thickness and a moderate rate fetches a premium price for use in of height increase, and are usually ice-cream. A similar trait is known in more productive of kernel and oil India, Indonesia and Sri Lanka, and than either parent type. an isolated mutant of this type has been observed in Solomon Islands.

42 chapter 3 e life story of a palm from seed to first fruit

Here we follow the stages in the life of a palm, from the germination of the giant seed (the nut), through the consumption by the seedling of the energy reserve in the kernel, to its gradual ‘weaning’ onto its own photosynthetic energy supply as leaves emerge. e young palm reaches full independence from the seed at about 12 months. After three or four years, the first inflorescence emerges and fruiting begins. e effects of different environments on the partitioning of energy between the fronds, trunk and fruits affect productivity.

43 Starting with the seed … e husk of the ripe coconut of being dispersed on the ocean seed (the fruit) loses moisture by because immersion of the emerged e coconut fruit, which develops evaporation to achieve the buoyancy seedling in salt water is fatal. Fruit on the palm for 12 months (a little it needs for its natural dispersal from a domesticated population longer where there is a cool season), across oceans. e seed of the wild- therefore has less chance of natural becomes a mature seed when its type palm passes through a period dispersal than wild fruit. husk dries out and loses the fresh, of enforced dormancy, which is Whatever the delay before bright colours of immaturity. extended while it is floating on the germination, the process thereafter ocean or being held in dry storage. e coconut seed is the second largest is the same. e inner part of the Remoistening with fresh water in the plant kingdom, and weighs from coconut seed, within the husk, breaks this dormancy and stimulates one to four kilograms. It is exceeded is the hard ‘nut’ familiar in trade germination. in size only by the 20–50-kilogram worldwide, but only those who have seed of the extremely rare ‘coco-de- In contrast, the domesticated visited productive palm locations mer’ or double coconut (Loidicea coconut fruit, whose natural or nearby markets are aware of seychellarum), native to the Seychelles behaviour has been much altered by the thick body of fibrous husk Islands in the north-west Indian human selection, often germinates surrounding the nut. is is almost Ocean) and on view in a few botanical while hanging on the bunch. Such always partly or completely removed gardens in the tropical world, notably a sprouted fruit, when it eventually before delivery to distant food Peredeniya in Sri Lanka and the falls to the ground, has no chance markets. Townsville Palmetum in Australia.

Figure 3-1 e coconut embryo, which generally measures 8 mm long by 5 mm diameter (right), the ‘socket’ that it occupies in the kernel (middle), and an outside view (left) of the surface of the kernel, separated from the shell and with its thin brown coat also removed, showing the outer end of the embryo awaiting the stimulus needed to germinate. (Simon Foale)

44 e embryo of the seed is concealed 28°C, early growth following beneath the ‘soft eye’ at the top of the germination is concealed by the husk nut (distinguishable from the other for 30–40 days. A dehusked nut is two ‘blind eyes’), and its emergence also capable of germination when from the soft eye signals germination. surrounded by a vapour-saturated In a tropical environment with a atmosphere (for example, within a mean daily temperature around plastic bag that contains a source of moisture), and this has made possible detailed observation of early development.

e first growth after germination takes the form of a soft, expanding, white lump of tissue, which shows no change of shape for two weeks. At the same time, the embryo develops an organ of spongy tissue (technically, the haustorium) that expands rapidly Figure 3-3. A coconut seedling into the cavity of the nut, usually with the husk removed showing its filling it completely within four attachment to the nut, from which months, although in a large nut this it is drawing sustenance, and its would take a little longer. developing roots. A parallel can be drawn between the function of the haustorium and e husk hides the very that of the placenta of mammals, young seedling including humans. e haustorium provides a conduit for the supply e external growth, which is Figure 3-2. Section through a of nutrients between the ‘mother’ attractive to chewing insects, would germinated coconut fruit showing (in this case the large mass of be very vulnerable without the the expanded haustorium (referred kernel concealed within the nut) protection of the husk. After two to in Melanesia as the ‘egg’) and the new organism. e supply weeks, it hardens a little and then occupying most of the cavity, and is sustained for many months, begins to form the first root on the also the shoot, aged about 3 months. until the new organism is sturdy underside, followed by the shoot e haustorium eventually fills the and capable of detachment and on the upper side. A fruit placed whole cavity, absorbing all the kernel. independent growth. in a nursery should not be rolled

45 over during this concealed phase haustorium makes contact with the each larger than the one before. Each of germination, as the direction entire inner surface of the kernel new leaf supplies a greater share of the roots and shoot would become (except in very large nuts), releasing the energy needs of the seedling, distorted and their growth would be softening enzymes as it does so. It which thereby becomes less and less retarded. e shoot tip requires two rapidly absorbs the nut water, and reliant on the diminishing kernel to to four weeks to elongate sufficiently from the kernel it takes nutrients sustain its accelerating growth. to appear through the husk, at an increasing rate to provide e rich nutrient and energy depending on its vigour and on the substance and energy for the growth mixture derived from the kernel thickness of the husk. Slicing off a of the seedling. is delivered by the haustorium to section of husk immediately above In the three-month gap between the developing seedling for at least the soft eye hastens emergence. germination and the expansion 12 months, although sooner or In the purposeful management of of the first green leaf, the seedling later a proportion of seeds suffers the seedling, the early phase is called depends solely on the kernel for its invasion by fungi or bacteria that the ‘pre-nursery’. It is followed by the energy supply. ere follows a period disable the haustorium. While the planting of the developing seedling of gradual ‘weaning’ as the young seedling is able to survive this loss into a large polybag, by which time seedling expands a series of leaves, of access to the kernel, it suffers a the roots have probably emerged from the underside of the husk, sometimes struggling to force their tips through the thin, but rather tough, outer layer. is layer is best sliced away to encourage rapid root emergence. If the nut is large, more of the husk might need to be sliced off to fit it more readily into the polybag, submerged to half its depth in the potting soil.

e seedling ‘sponges’ from the kernel e haustorium—the soft, spongy internal organ expanding within Figure 3-4. Polybag seedlings in a large plantation nursery in Mozambique the nut—is often referred to as (1992). e seedlings will be transplanted to the field without any significant the ‘egg’ or ‘apple’. Progressively, the setback after developing three or four more leaves.

46 noticeable setback to growth, the one. e fronds become progressively e newest inflorescence appears severity of which is related to the longer and quicker to emerge during associated with the frond that has timing of the loss. this phase, so that by the age of reached the 10th to 12th position five years they are approaching the down from the youngest emerging At 12 months of age, with the maximum length of around seven frond. kernel nearly exhausted and the fully metres on Tall palms (three to five e tiny male flowers at the tips of independent young palm displaying metres on Dwarfs) and are emerging the many inflorescence branches seven or eight leaves, the seedling every 25–30 days. A slower growth begin shedding their pollen is ready to be transplanted into the rate is brought about by prolonged immediately upon exposure, and field or garden. dry weather, poor soil nutrient those below them on each branch supply, insect damage or markedly e early leaves are ‘entire’, which gradually follow suit over about three cool seasonal weather, such as occurs means that each has a single large weeks. A few days after all pollen- in most inhabited coastal areas in blade comprising leaflets that are shedding is complete, the female northern Australia other than the joined at the edges. Later leaves flowers become ‘pollen-ready’ and will display separated lower leaflets, extreme north of Cape York. while the upper ones remain joined. Before long, a leaf emerges on which Flowering begins all the leaflets are separated, and this form of leaf is referred to as a frond. e Tall palm begins to flower e earliness of the appearance between four and 10 years of age, of the first true frond varies while some Dwarf types flower considerably between varieties, and earlier. e flower, referred to as is another means of identification an inflorescence or flower bunch of genetic subgroups within the Tall (because it has many branches group of coconut varieties. bearing male flowers on the upper part of their length and female Growth of the flowers lower down), is encased in a independent seedling robust, spear-like sheath protruding up to one metre from the inner side Figure 3-5. Newly emerged Under ideal conditions of plentiful of the base of its accompanying inflorescence featuring small ‘knob- water supply, a mean temperature frond. e tough ‘skin’ or casing of like’ female flower-buds close to the around 27°C and fertile soil, the the fully extended sheath splits and near end of some branches, and transplanted coconut seedling will shrinks back somewhat, leaving the numerous tiny male flowers attached grow very rapidly, each new frond multibranched inflorescence openly along the length of each branch. emerging six weeks after the previous displayed. (Asia Pacific Coconut Community)

47 usually be pollinated from another conform to a set geometrical pattern If frond 1 in a series is given the palm by either insect-borne or wind- of angular separation around the azimuth angle of zero degrees, frond borne pollen. A Tall palm growing circumference of the palm trunk. It 2 will be located at plus or minus in isolation is unlikely to set many is convenient to use the navigation 140 degrees, frond 3 at 280 degrees, fruit because of the usual poor ‘click’ term ‘azimuth’ to refer to this angle of frond 4 past the starting angle at or coincidence of its male and female separation of fronds, as if they were all 60 degrees on the second circuit, flower activity. It has been noticed, attached to the centre of a horizontal frond 5 at 200 degrees and frond 6 however, that in midsummer in circle surrounding the trunk. at 340 degrees, 20 degrees short of Australia (mean temperature around 27–30°C), and also quite commonly among domesticated palms in wet season conditions in the tropics, the rate of emergence of new flowers is more rapid. is generates an overlap, so that pollen from the following inflorescence sometimes reaches the pollen-ready female flowers of the previous inflorescence, allowing up to 60% self-pollinated fruit to set. In contrast to the high rate of cross- pollination in Talls, most Dwarfs self-pollinate up to 90% of the time, because the male and female phases are active at the same time within each inflorescence. Such palms readily set fruit in isolation.

What gives the palm crown its great shape? Figure 3-6. Diagram illustrating the location of successive semi-circular frond e crown of the palm is made up base attachments to the trunk of the coconut palm. e circled numbers show of 20–35 fronds, depending on how that the fifth frond either up or down from frond 1 is only 20 degrees of angle favourable the growing environment short of being on a line directly above or below frond 1. Cumulative degrees is. e fronds emerging in sequence of angle anti-clockwise from frond 1 are shown on the lines radiating from the from the central bud of the palm centre of the trunk.

48 completing the second full circle. e is natural separation reduces in low; a period of low production result of this spiral pattern is that the some measure the shading of lower allows more fronds to retain a more 6th frond is located 20 degrees short fronds by those above when the sun erect attitude. of being directly above frond 1. is is overhead. e influence on the shape of pattern of angular relation between the palm crown of the change in the fronds of the coconut is referred Crown shape responds partitioning of resources as flowers to as a ‘2/5 phyllotaxis’ (phyllotaxis is to age and fruit develop has an interesting a Latin word for ‘leaf arrangement’). During the course of about 30 years effect. In a young palm, where all the e location of frond 6, almost following planting, the shape of the energy from photosynthesis flows directly above frond 1 (or below, palm crown evolves from an early into the development of new fronds if the counting begins at the top ‘feather duster’ shape, through an rather than the bottom of the ‘upright’ hemispherical form in which crown), allows for rapid counting of the older fronds have a horizontal the number of fronds on the palm. attitude, to one in which the fronds Simply locate the oldest green frond are ‘loose’ and displayed in a range on the palm; look just above it and of positions, depending on their either slightly to the right or left for age, between upright and drooping. frond 6, then above that again for e combination of young fronds frond 11, and so on. Observing total pointing upwards and older ones in frond number a useful way to judge progressively more drooping positions the relative vigour of palms. gives an overall open character and at fronds 6, 11, 16 and so on are spherical shape to the crown. on either a left-hand or right-hand is evolution begins at the path above the starting point is transition from a juvenile to a because the fronds of half the palms productive palm at the age of five to in a group will spiral clockwise and ten years (earlier in the Dwarf ) and Figure 3-7. is young palm has those of the other half will spiral continues because of the increasing well-separated frond bases, that are anticlockwise. One researcher claimed priority that the palm gives to fruit attached to the trunk at intervals to have proof that clockwise and production during the early years, more than 50 mm apart, providing anticlockwise palms differed in yield and the consequent decreasing ample space to ‘cling’ closely to the potential, but others were sceptical. importance of trunk growth. If trunk. Frond numbering here is done It is unusual for a palm to have any the palm has an exceptionally high ‘upwards’, placing frond 6 almost fronds near to each other that are fruit load, or is stressed by drought, directly above frond 1, as shown in aligned at the same azimuth angle. more fronds may be found hanging Figure 3-6.

49 and of trunk, there is sufficient e result is that the attitude, or be sustained by allocating fewer energy to generate a long vertical gap, angle of display (in a vertical plane), resources to the growth of the trunk. or ‘internode’, between fronds on the of each frond evolves gradually In turn, this increases the crowding trunk (100 mm or so). Because each from vertical upon first emergence of the fronds on the trunk and the frond then has a substantial portion through 45 degrees around length of the fronds themselves also of trunk to itself, the lower stem 10 months of age, 100 degrees begins to diminish, contributing to a (petiole) of the frond maintains a (horizontal) at 18 months and further decline in light interception. position closely hugging the trunk, 135 degrees (pointing somewhat Palms can live to 100 years and free of any contact with fronds higher downwards) when the frond is two more, but at that age the crown is up. ere is a gentle curving out or years of age or older. e combined very small, the trunk has tapered to drooping of the top ends of these effect of 20 or more fronds, each a ‘pencil point’, and nut production is fronds, under the influence of gravity. angled a little further from the close to nil. e overall shape of the crown is that vertical than its next, younger of an inverted cone, which achieves neighbour, is a spherical shape in the high and efficient light interception, palm crown—a shape that is typical and therefore rapid growth. of Tall palms older than 20–30 years (and Dwarf palms older than Fruiting begins: a 10 years), and which constitutes the competition for resources classical ‘loose, languid and relaxed’ image of the coconut palm. Once fruiting begins, the energy A palm crown with this spherical need of fruit growth is met at the display of fronds intercepts less light expense of the trunk, resulting over a than it did with a similar number of few years in a significant shortening fronds in a more hemispherical or of the internodes. As the internode inverted conical shape. Downward space decreases, the base of each frond hanging fronds receive little light, is subjected to increasing outward while only a few fronds are held pressure from the thick basal part of in the horizontal position to the two fronds immediately above intercept the maximum available. it, tending to force it away from the e productivity of the ageing palm Figure 3-8. Crowded frond bases of a trunk and weakening its attachment gradually diminishes, because of the mature palm, which has developed or ‘grip’ on the trunk. e base of each reduction in photosynthesis that a spherical crown shape. e inter- frond also experiences the increasing goes with reduced light interception. node space on the trunk here is only weight of its bunch of fruit, which also ere is often some compensation 5 to 10 mm compared with 50 mm tends to pull it away from the trunk. apparent, however: fruit yield can in Figure 3-7 above. (Simon Foale)

50 Why does the palm on the lean of these palms is quite small. proliferating tuft of roots attached to strand lean towards the Neighbouring palms on the inland the point of the cone. ere is little water? side of those closest to the water change in this geometry until the grow vertically, being shielded from trunk base reaches its full diameter the ocean’s intense reflected light. (in the range 600–900 mm) at about An attractive feature of Tall palms five years in a Tall palm. on the strand is their graceful angle Leaning palms that have grown tall, over the beach towards the water. placing their centre of gravity well is occurs because the reflected away from the trunk, may experience light from the surface of the water some shift in the attachment of their is more intense than light coming foundations (root mass) to the soil. from ‘inland’. All plants respond to e weight of the crown and upper uneven light by growing towards trunk, amounting to more than half the stronger source, achieved by a tonne on a healthy fruit-laden generating a growth hormone that palm, exercises great leverage on the elongates the growth of the stem base of the trunk. e combination on the side of weaker illumination. of saturated soil and strong wind Once the crown of the coconut palm will often cause the palm to lean reaches the tilt angle that distributes further—in extreme cases almost the incoming light more or less laying the palm trunk onto the beach evenly, that angle is sustained, and (Figure 3-10). New growth of the the trunk extends in that direction, trunk will be adjusted back to its leaning towards the water. original angle, and the result is a very attractive incremental upward curve Figure 3-9. Palms close to the beach Palms have a greater lean on a of the trunk on the right have a pronounced strand aligned north to south. In lean towards the beach in response such a location, the water is on Maintaining a grip on the to reflected light, compared with either the east side or the west earth ‘shaded’ palms on the left. is side of the beach, and the reflected effect has been observed to be light is particularly intense for a e young palm relies first on a more pronounced on north–south few hours in the morning or the small tuft of roots of equal thickness beaches as the intensity of reflected afternoon. On east–west coastlines, (around 10 mm), each attached light reaching the coconut fronds the reinforcement of incoming light to the fleshy base just below the is much higher, especially during is less intense because the direction growing bud. Gradually, a woody early to mid-morning and mid to the light comes from is side-on to trunk foundation forms in the soil late-afternoon periods, than on palms on the beach. e angle of as an inverted cone, with the now east–west beaches.

51 At the early, inverted cone stage, the palm is easily blown over by strong wind (Figure 3-11). Root ‘initials’ may then begin to emerge from beneath the perimeter of the trunk base, but these outer roots do not usually have a firm grip on the earth until the palm is around six years of age. By then, some dozens of primary roots, now up to 12 mm in diameter, radiate from the entire circumference of the root base.

Figure 3-10. A coconut trunk on a northern beach in Trinidad lowered almost Palm roots branch two or three onto the sand as natural leaning and strong wind have forced the roots to give times to form ever thinner way. Such an attitude enhances the association of the coconut with relaxed secondary, tertiary and feeder root holidays. e author is on the left – 1959. branches. Individual primary roots extend many metres and usually die back after three years. ere are no root hairs, but reports from India indicate that certain symbiotic fungi form a working association with coconut roots, supplying mineral nutrients in return for energy.

In a Tall palm, the broad base of the trunk (known as the bole) undergoes, from about one metre above the ground, a tapering transition to the long-term diameter (300–400 mm; see Figure 2-1 in Chapter 2). e bole provides a robust foundation for the trunk. Until the peripheral Figure 3-11. Young palms in Solomon Islands blown down by moderate cyclonic roots develop and take hold, the wind in 1967 at a growth stage before their roots had achieved firm anchorage young palm is very susceptible to in the soil. wind damage, partly because the

52 Dwarfs are at greater risk because they are scattered among than Talls taller palms. Risk of wind damage is greatest in plantations, where palms e Dwarf palm is more vulnerable of the same age and height are well to wind than the Tall, as it does not spaced over a large area with no form a significant bole (Figure 2-1). natural windbreak except each other, e Dwarf is anchored by a root exposing them to destructive winds system attached to a much narrower at their most susceptible age. trunk base, which suffers a severe mechanical disadvantage compared Survivors can last (almost) to the base of the Tall. When the forever wind applies pressure to the crown, the Dwarf palm experiences greater Once a palm has survived the early shearing strain between roots and period of vulnerability to wind and trunk than does the broader-based reached an age of 15–20 years, it Tall of similar height. e Dwarf becomes highly resilient and might Figure 3-12. e exposed roots of a escapes some leverage hazard, live to a much greater age, depending palm growing on the strand. e wave however, because at a given age it is on the situation. Indigenous people action of a stormy sea has eroded much shorter than the Tall. are generally reluctant to destroy an much of the sand berm, putting the old coconut palm that produces even palm in danger of collapse. e huge In a gale, the trunk of a youngish a small fraction of its earlier yield, root mass of the coconut acts as a Dwarf palm with stout roots can and old palms make little demand stabilising influence on many beaches. snap just below the crown. e bole on the environment and cast only a is firmly attached to the soil, but the diminished shadow on crops beneath trunk still lacks flexibility to bend to them. Sometimes, very tall palms are trunk extends rapidly once the bole the wind, and older fronds do not blown over during storms because is formed. e trunk of a five to six shed as readily from palms in the 10 the attachment of old roots to rain- year old palm is already capped by to 20-year age range as they do from saturated or flooded soil is weak. a full-sized crown, but is not yet older palms. long enough to flex properly, and the It is not uncommon to see very trunk-to-root interface experiences In natural coconut woodlands, old palms eventually decapitated severe mechanical stress when there which are still found on some atolls by wind, after which the trunk is high wind pressure on the crown. such as North Keeling (in the will decay, crumbling in sections, Cocos–Keeling Islands in the Indian over three to five years if it is left Ocean), younger palms are to some untouched. e trunk can be extent protected from wind damage harvested for milling, but this is

53 best carried out in a planned way on younger palms, after setting up the transport system and special sawing tools that are needed for best results (see Chapter 8). Lightning strike is another hazard for the palm, increasing as the palm grows ever taller. Immediately after a strike there is no apparent damage, but the effect of the electrical discharge seems to be to cut off ‘life support’ through damage to the nutrient transport system of the trunk. e fronds gradually go brown over a month or so and the crown collapses shortly afterwards. Figure 3-13. Headless trunks of e ‘headless’ trunk will slowly palms that have been poisoned in decay over years, collapsing bit by preparation for replanting. ese bit in short sections. In a plantation, trunks are destined to collapse in a single severe lightning strike can sections from the top, as they decay destroy as many as 40 palms. over a period of two to four years.

54 chapter 4 Taking the plunge looking after your own palms

Here are guidelines to determine if the coconut palm is the right choice for a plantation, a home garden, a resort or a public space, for finding a spot where it will do well and for choosing a variety. is is only the beginning, as there are seedlings to manage, soil to learn about and, perhaps, irrigation to install. How will the local climate, and any threatening pests and diseases, influence what is to be done?

55 Latitude and climate temperature is below 21°C, any e natural environment in which might restrict potential fruit that sets will usually fall before the palm evolved is the upper strand, reaching maturity. or beach ridges immediately above Moderate-to-good fruit production the level of major high tides. While can only be expected within Study the soil and take the root system will tolerate brief 18 degrees of latitude north or expert advice inundation with salt water, the palm south of the equator (see zones 1 will not prosper if there is no regular and 2 of Figure 1-5 in Chapter 1), Once you are satisfied that the seaward flow of fresh groundwater, in locations where there is deep temperature regime is favourable, or diluting or even flushing out salinity fertile soil and assured year-round at least reasonable for the desired use from the root zone. rainfall (or planned watering where of the palm, choose or develop the there is a significant annual dry planting site to do best for the plant. At sites away from the beach, free season). In addition, in regions drainage is especially important. e coconut (like any tree crop, more distant than 14 degrees from A soil profile with impeded water really) performs best on a well- the equator, the season of cool movement due to sodicity (excess drained soil that has a two-metre temperature must be short (no more exchangeable sodium, which depth of profile, a loamy texture than three months) and mild. Some suppresses clay aggregation so and neutral pH (that is, neither of the most productive palms in the that the clay particles form an acid nor alkaline), and is well world are found on the well-watered impervious layer) or due to a high supplied with mineral nutrients. coasts and immediate hinterland of content of non-cracking types of e coconut requires the same South Pacific islands where there clay, or of crusted laterite (ancient nutrients as all other plants and is no cool season, and the diurnal red clay high in iron oxide), is a greater supply of chlorine than temperature range is generally 23– unsuitable for coconut. most, which is the reason so much 31°C, with practically no variation folklore mentions the need for Ideal soil types, apart from coralline, in mean temperature between ‘salt’ as a fertiliser. e palm also volcanic or silica sands accumulated months of the year. tolerates a moderate amount of on the strand, are recent alluvium At latitudes greater than 18 degrees salinity in the groundwater, as long (which is generally loamy), and in and up to 30 degrees (zone 3 of as the saline water table fluctuates situ weathered volcanics, which Figure 1-5), the coconut palm may regularly (as with a rise and fall comprise well-structured red or black grow well enough to develop a responding to the ocean tide) or clay soils. Coconut also does well on handsome crown, but fruiting will remains fairly deep. e coconut cracking clay over porous uplifted be more erratic with increases in leaf can accumulate sodium without coral benches—not uncommon in latitude. In locations where there is harm—especially when potassium, Melanesia (Papua New Guinea, a period longer than four months for which it has a high requirement, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Fiji) during which with the mean is scarce. but rare in Australia.

56 Annual rainfall of 2000 mm, When very strong wind follows for much longer after field planting. which is sufficient to match soaking rain, however, the e fruit is more readily harvested evaporative demand in most coastal attachment of the entire root but, being smaller, contains less environments, would be ideal if it mass to the soil may be weakened, water. e kernel is usually thinner were evenly distributed throughout allowing the trunk to be forced and softer at maturity and has less the year. e palm will not achieve its sideways. In extreme cases, the flavour, because it has a lower oil potential in far northern Australia, or trunk will end on its side, exposing content than kernel from a Tall nut. in much of southern India, without broken roots encased in a ball of When planting mainly for some irrigation during extended dry- earth. Many roots on the side of the ornamentation, consider both the season periods of severe water deficit. ball that rests on the soil will remain slender and compact Dwarf varieties. unbroken, and the palm often e slender Dwarfs provide a choice survives such trauma. e coconut is ‘building of attractive orange, yellow and green friendly’ Choosing the best variety Neighbouring plants, and building for your purpose structures such as pipes and e final task, in preparing to develop pavements, are not adversely affected a coconut garden or landscape by the roots of coconut palms, feature, is to decide what type of palm which are, in botanical parlance, to use. Your decision will depend on ‘adventitious’. Each primary root can the choices available, which are in the grow for about three years, reaching first instance between Dwarf and several metres in length but with a Tall, and then between types within small diameter of 8–12 mm. e the chosen group. root dies back soon after reaching its full extension, making way for e Dwarf has the advantage of a new root to replace it. ese a slow rate of height increase and short-lived, non-expanding roots smaller fruit than the Tall, lessening extend when the soil is moist and the hazard posed in public space by easily penetrated. ey do not falling nuts. e Dwarf also tends expand during their short life and to form an attractive, open, spherical therefore pose no risk to concrete crown at an earlier age than the Tall, Figure 4-1. A productive orange Dwarf slabs, pavings or other soil-covering and the crown is always smaller. On palm in Vanuatu, showing the slightly structures, which ordinary trees the other hand, the Dwarf is less pale colour of the foliage. e orange with expanding lateral roots often robust in strong wind, and remains character partly masks the natural seriously undermine. accessible to browsing herbivores green of chlorophyll in the leaflets.

57 fruit colours, as well as a less striking and nine months of age. Where If you are planting on a plantation brown (see Figure 2-2), and pose many seedlings are being raised scale (which means a uniform a smaller risk to visitors if the fruit together, keep a careful watch for planting of more than a dozen falls from the palm. An indication of insect pests and leaf pathogens, palms) with coconuts destined to the future fruit colour of a seedling which can spread quickly in the become the dominant members of coconut can be seen in the colour nursery environment. the plant community, it is best to of the rounded undersurface of plant on a triangular or diamond the petiole, and also in paleness When planting on a commercial pattern at about 8-metre centres (resembling chlorosis) of the leaflets. scale, seeking maximum productivity, for Talls and 6.5-metre centres for e normal foliage colour of healthy discard seedlings that lag behind in Dwarfs. In ornamental situations, yellow and orange-fruiting Dwarfs the nursery. Up to one third might the coconut is found planted in tight is a somewhat pale green, compared be rejected, and some managers ‘hedgerows’, clusters and avenues. with the dark green or brownish recommend even tougher selection. ere is no particular constraint foliage of palms whose fruit will be e causes of poor growth include on density in such situations, but those colours. genetic faults, damage to the shoot Talls spaced less than 5 m apart will while it pushes through the husk have considerable interlocking of at germination, and loss of the fronds. In a tightly spaced cluster, Managing the nursery and connection between the seedling and planting out competition for light causes more the reserves of kernel within the nut. rapid elongation of the trunk, and Leaf damage caused by insects or leaf the crowns develop an upswept Having chosen a suitable location spot fungus might also cause rejection. and variety for planting, it is best habit that might be less pleasing to raise seedlings in polybags and In the field, make the planting hole than the normal open (relaxed) to plant them out at 8–12 months large enough to allow the complete crowns of widely spaced palms. of age (or a few months older in volume of soil from the container places with a cool season). By then, to be inserted, with extra space for Protecting the young growing in a large (20 L) pot or topsoil to be packed in all around. It palm polybag in full sunlight (see Figure is wise to put a handful (300 g) of 3-4), seedlings are well developed NPK fertiliser in the bottom of the Worldwide, a huge range of and can easily be examined for hole, and to cover the surface around potential pests can seriously damage normal healthy appearance. During the seedling with a thick layer of the young coconut palm, both in the nursery phase, seedlings need mulch. Treat the coconut like any the nursery and in the field. Some regular watering and they usually other fruit tree, but ensure that of the most damaging of these benefit from a nutrient supplement added fertiliser is rich in potassium are discussed in Chapter 5. If of 50 g NPK fertiliser (or its and chlorine, two nutrients that are you are unfamiliar with possible equivalent in compost) at three, six especially in demand by the palm. pests, get local knowledge from

58 taste for palm heart during the first year or two of the coconut’s growth in the field. If there is a risk, use a close-fitting cylindrical shield of wire mesh but remove it before it restricts development. Where there is an extended dry season with high temperatures and low humidity, the young field palm might need some shielding or shading. In India, the leaflets of a mature coconut frond are woven into a tubular ‘umbrella’ that is fitted over the palm.

How soon will the palms flower? Where the temperature and soil conditions are ideal, most Tall Figure 4-2. Crowded palms, showing how the fronds retain an upwards attitude palms will flower within four to six due to competition for light stimulating growth of long internodes on the trunk. years from field planting as polybag seedlings, and Dwarfs within two an experienced grower or a plant e younger leaves of a coconut to four years. ere might first be protection professional in your palm are also very palatable to one or two inflorescences devoid of neighbourhood. You might protect livestock. It may be necessary, where female flowers, but then prolific fruit a small number of seedlings with animals have access, to construct a setting will begin. Within a year or vigilant inspection, but in some cage around young palms until they two, there could be a hundred fruit instances you may need chemical have grown tall enough to escape growing on the palm, distributed protection, especially against scale the attention of cattle, goats, horses on 13–17 bunches. As the owner or and leaf-miner pests. In most and other herbivores. e wild manager, you must now deal with countries of the coconut heartland, pig, several rat species, other small the special needs of the producing the rhinoceros beetle is the most mammals around the world, swamp palm and organise an appropriate common forager likely to inflict hens and some other large birds return from its production. Where serious damage on young palms. have all been known to develop a the uncontrolled fall of fruit might

59 Australian environments and the coconut

A huge range: 19 degrees of regarded as the lower limit for active latitude growth and fruit setting. e maps in Figure 1-12 (Chapter 1) show the Within Australia, which provides average isotherms on the Australian an interesting case-study for landmass for the four seasons, temperature response, the coconut identifying both lower and upper is widely scattered along the coast. limits for the coconut to do well. Only the climate of the Torres Strait Islands, north of Cape York, South of the latitude of Townsville approaches the ideal temperature (19 degrees south), however, regime. However, the temperature growth and productivity fall on the coast from Townsville progressively, because the weather (latitude 19 degrees south) becomes cooler for longer as northwards and westwards around latitude increases. Whereas Figure 4-3. Woven coconut leaflets the Gulf of Carpentaria and across Townsville has a ‘coconut winter’ installed some months earlier, as northern Australia, right around of two months, at Byron Bay shade protection against excessive to Broome (18 degrees south), (29 degrees) the coconut winter heat, on a newly-planted young comprising 30 000 kilometres of lasts for seven months. Even at palm which has now outgrown this coastline, is quite favourable to this limit of southward extension, protection (in India). the palm. Other, less favourable, however, the palm can develop environmental factors along much robust fronds and present its become a hazard to people or of this coastline include extensive typical attractive appearance. e property, special protective measures saline wetlands and mudflats, the coconut can be found in many are needed (see Chapter 6). normally long dry season, an average other parts of the world at a similar yearly rainfall well below 2000 mm latitude, beautifying beachfronts, Where conditions are less than and, in some parts, a mean daily city streets and home gardens. e ideal, first flowering will take longer maximum temperature exceeding lack of fruit is actually desirable, in and production will be less prolific. 36°C for six months of the year. terms of safety, in public spaces. However, the coconut is a hardy plant that can produce usefully on mediocre Low temperature is only a minor While coconut palms are found in soil, or in a climate with a cool season issue on the north coast, as there are many scattered locations around (mean temperature below 22°C) up only two or three months of the year the north coast of Australia, there to three months long, or with both when the mean temperature falls are also some palms growing well these constraints combined. close to the 21°C mark, which is at locations hundreds of kilometres

60 Challenges specific to Australia consumes the soft white layers of tissue before they begin to unfold, In north-eastern Australia, the after which the leaflets become green greatest challenge in raising a young and unpalatable to the pest. is palm to fruit-bearing age, apart from leaf-mining leaves behind patches measures to avoid severe water stress, of brown, ‘dead’ tissue, and seriously is in protecting it against pests. sets back the growth of the young e palm dart caterpillar (larva of palm, especially in the first year of a moth of the genus Cephrenes), two of its life. which feeds on some native Australian palms, is strongly attracted to the foliage of coconuts of any age. e caterpillar stitches together the two edges of a leaflet to provide a tubular safe haven during the day, and it feeds voraciously at night. Undetected, this pest Figure 4-4. Fruitless and therefore multiplies rapidly and can completely ‘safe’ palms in suburban Brisbane, defoliate a young palm in a few Australia. e cool season is too weeks. Protection is simple, as the long for fruit retention. See the pest will succumb to all the common temperature graph in Figure 1-14. garden insecticide sprays. Spraying the underside of the leaflet works inland, such as at Katherine in well, because that side is less likely the Northern Territory (latitude to be washed free of the chemical in 14 degrees south) and Moura in rain and because it forms the inside Queensland (24 degrees). e surface of the caterpillar’s shelter. young palm will survive in a frost- Around 1972, the Melanesian free location, or where mild frost coconut leaf beetle (Brontispa Figure 4-5. Leaflets of a young palm occurs infrequently, provided that it longissima), a small black beetle with severely damaged by the Palm Dart has frost protection until it is a few an orange head, arrived in Darwin caterpillar (in Brisbane). is pest metres high and its growing fronds and northern Cape York. e attacks the leaflets of many palm are above the lethal freezing air layer. newly hatched larva of Brontispa species on the east coast of Australia, enters between the tightly packed and remains active even during the leaflets of the emerging frond and cool season.

61 is pest can be killed easily by greater damage from the beetle, and applying any water-based insecticide should be replaced with plants of to the emerging ‘spear’, but be Melanesian ancestry. Fortunately, careful to follow the manufacturer’s Brontispa is uncommon or absent in directions and wear any major Australian coastal towns other recommended protective clothing. than Broome, Darwin, Cooktown Do not spray with a household and Cairns, but coconut managers pressure pack, as the carrier liquid should remain on the alert for damages living tissue. Application of outbreaks. chemicals becomes difficult on taller Grasshoppers (locusts) also attack palms, once the emerging frond young coconut leaves, but the large is located more than three metres dynastid beetles (such as Oryctes above the ground. rhinoceros) that destroy or severely Palm varieties from Papua New damage the foliage of palms in Guinea and Solomon Islands are many other countries are not found fairly tolerant of Brontispa, showing anywhere in Australia. only minor damage and therefore If other pests appear to be harming needing protection only for the your palms, seek local specialist first year or two. Coconut varieties advice. originating in South-East Asia suffer

62 chapter 5 Caring for the palm from planting out till flowering and beyond

As the palm grows, herbivores from scale insects to buffalo forage on fronds within reach, while trunk-tunnelling beetles remain active and many new insects are attracted to the inflorescence. Some pests and diseases are globally significant; others, including two leaf-eaters, are pests in Australia. Viroid, virus and mycoplasma diseases pose a major threat in some regions of the world. e coconut has an almost unique nutritional need for ample soil chlorine, reflecting its evolutionary niche on the strand. Palms tolerate some water deficit, a small degree of soil salinity, and seasonal use of saline irrigation water. Nutrient needs can be identified through visual symptoms and chemical analysis of leaves.

63 Palatable palms attract chew its way into the central cluster Among the few other potentially hungry creatures of developing fronds. When the fatal pests of the coconut is the fronds emerge fully, they display sets black palm weevil (Rhyncophorus Fronds hanging within one or two of pruned leaflets that form triangular bilineatus). Gaining entry to the metres of the ground are at risk from gaps on either side of the frond axis. upper trunk through the feeding destructive browsing by herbivorous If the foraging beetle happens to paths of rhinoceros beetles or mammals (cow, buffalo, horse, sheep, chew its way right into the growing any deep trunk wound caused by goat, and pig). A large herbivore point, the palm dies, as the coconut mechanical damage, the weevil can drag a whole frond within reach has (with rare exceptions) just the establishes itself inside the palm once it can grasp the drooping end one vegetative bud. and goes on breeding there until the with its mouth. Protection for the palm dies. is deadly combination palm until the fronds are out of e rhinoceros beetle breeds only of a ‘break-and-enter’ pest with one reach will defeat browsers. on decaying coconut logs, and that multiplies profusely within therefore precautions against it the palm is, luckily, not globally e manager must change the are crucial when old palms are common. focus of protection, however, when dying and being replaced by new emerging inflorescences (see Figure plantings. A related beetle in western An ‘eel worm’, the red ring nematode, 3-5) begin to supply a whole new Melanesia, Scapanes australis, fatally attacks coconuts in some range of food supplies, especially for breeds more flexibly, and can use Caribbean countries. e nematode insects. At regular intervals of 25–30 fallen forest logs. Both types can proliferates within the trunk until days, each new inflorescence presents be checked by clearing away any the population of microscopic a fresh supply of many grams of breeding sites near the coconut worms clogs up the vascular tissue pollen, tender female flower buds, palms. When these pests have to the extent that a reddish-brown and a copious amount of nectar. become active in a plantation, both ring appears in a cross-section of Each of these episodes attracts many chemical compounds (insecticidal the trunk. is invasion eventually new insects, both friendly (such as powders) and biological agents (viral retards the essential movement of honeybees) and unfriendly (such as and fungal pathogens) can be used water and nutrients sufficiently to sap-sucking bugs, and web-makers against them, but cleaning around cause death. that smother the male flowers). the plantation and hand-picking of the adult beetles are still the A few species of locust and stick Adult palms are liable to attack by recommended ways to control them. insect are capable of severely rhinoceros beetles (Oryctes spp.) in defoliating the palm. Fortunately, many parts of the world; areas free Specialised reading and local such attacks tend to be sporadic, and of this pest are fortunate indeed. e consulting services can usually often the leaflets of older fronds are rhinoceros beetle, which may be 40– provide appropriate additional preferred, so that sufficient leaf area 50 mm long, uses very strong jaws to information. is spared for the palm to survive. In

64 Papua New Guinea and Indonesia, Nut-fall bugs undermine of which remain invisible for a particularly during the dry season, yield long time after infection, until no a grasshopper (Sexava sp.) has countermeasures are possible. sometimes completely defoliated Several types of sucking bugs e most worrying disease of palms, which have then taken years (Hemiptera) feed on the coconut coconut, worldwide, is known to recover. inflorescence. Some eat the nectar, while others simply suck sap from generically as lethal yellowing disease Leaf-eating caterpillars, scale insects the branches or even the button-like and, in Africa, by many local names and other creatures (termites in female flowers. is deprives the that distinguish some of its variants. a seasonally dry climate, and root flowers and young fruit of their full Although lethal yellowing does not caterpillars on peat soils) can share of energy from the palm and usually appear in palms before their sometimes pose a severe or even fatal reduces the setting of fruit. first flowering, it is listed in this threat. chapter for convenience. Some sucking pests focus on the Symptoms include premature fruit Many forest-dwelling plant species, successfully set young fruits for drop from all bunches, followed by including other palms, have been the first few months of growth, blackening of the newly emerged found by chemists to manufacture removing so much sap that the fruits inflorescence. ere is distinct their own protective phytochemicals drop off. Such a pest, known as the yellowing and then death of the to ward off attack—the end result nut-fall bug, is found on some South older fronds first, progressing of intense natural selection. As Pacific islands and in East Africa. through the younger ones until there the natural home of the coconut If the palm is home to certain active is a complete collapse of the crown. palm is the strand, relatively free ‘sugar’ ants (Oecophylla spp.), the nut- e period between first symptoms from sustained attack by the kinds fall bug is kept away from the young and death is 6–12 months. of insects found in diverse forest fruit. On the other hand, some other habitats, the coconut has not evolved Lethal yellowing was first recognised ants (Pheidole and Iridomyrmex spp.) a strong survival kit. Some coconut block the access of the sugar ant to as a disease in Jamaica around the varieties show greater tolerance palms, giving the nut-fall bug more mid-20th century and was eventually than others to particular pests, freedom to do serious damage. found to be caused by an pathogen which no doubt indicates that their characterised as a mycoplasma. More ancestral wild habitats were closer e greatest threat: lethal complex than a virus but lacking the to insect-rich floral communities. cell development of a bacterium, this Local knowledge, held by indigenous yellowing disease type of organism fits somewhere people and some professionals, can Whereas there are usually some between the two in terms of size and be of great value in taking advantage visible signs of insects and their biological complexity. Transmission of this important but invisible damage, the coconut is also prone to is most likely due to leaf-hoppers, protective capability. several fatal diseases, the symptoms

65 coincidentally related to those that Dwarfs (found to be at least partially different parts of the world is under transmit foliar decay (see below), but tolerant) and of hybrids between way, along with research into the there may be other vectors. Dwarfs and some promising Talls, tolerance found in some coconut notably Panama Tall. varieties. Improving the ‘security of e spread of the disease within production’ of the coconut might the past 50 years has been alarming. A disease similar to lethal yellowing ultimately depend on this work. It has appeared for the first time in has been known for many decades in many countries of Central America various coconut populations on the and the Caribbean, and even among coast of West Africa, in Tanzania Other viroid and virus ornamental coconut palms in (East Africa), in parts of southern diseases southern Florida and date palms India (where there is usually a e second most serious disease in Texas. e crisis continues in slower decline of the affected palm of coconuts (after lethal yellowing) Jamaica, despite extensive planting of than elsewhere), and more recently occurs in parts of the Philippines in some islands off the coast of and on Guam, where it is known Kalimantan, Indonesia. as cadang cadang (‘dying-dying’ in ere seems to be an important a local Philippines language) and connection between the expression tinangaja, respectively. of lethal yellowing disease symptoms and the stresses of extreme weather: is fatal disease is caused by a symptoms often appear during viroid. Viroids are the smallest drought, but also after severe known pathogens of plants and are, flooding events (for example, essentially, infective single molecules. flooding associated with intense Despite their size, they are somehow hurricanes). able to disrupt the normal functions of the plant cell. Uncertainty exists about the strength of some coconut varieties’ It is not yet known how the viroid observed tolerance to lethal spreads from palm to palm, and yellowing disease, and about the there is no hint that coconut varieties ability of the pathogen to spread might vary in their susceptibility to previously disease-free areas. A to it. In the Philippines, coconut concerted, long-term research effort growers in the affected areas ‘live Figure 5-1. An affected palm at an is needed, especially in Jamaica, with’ the disease, replacing dying early stage of lethal yellowing disease, Mexico, Florida and West Africa. palms and hoping that the new ones on the left, and a healthy palm on the Molecular investigation of the survive long enough to make the right, in Miami, Florida. (Simon Foale) variant forms of the mycoplasma in effort of planting them worthwhile.

66 e only known coconut disease when many palms are crowded especially cattle. Beneath old attributable to a true virus is known as together and the disease can spread plantations (where the coconut foliar decay. Confined to some islands rapidly. Fungicide treatments can canopy is above five metres) it is of Vanuatu, the disease causes loss give some protection during a common practice to grow shorter- of vigour and leads to death within disease outbreak. statured perennial crops, such as a few months of the first symptoms. cacao and fruit trees, and annual Fortunately, it is only transmitted Weed competition vegetables and food staples like in the saliva of a particular tiny maize, cassava and sweet potato, leaf-feeding insect (Myndus taffini) Other plants can threaten the which are often planted much found only in the local region, where productivity of the coconut. In earlier. Productivity of these it breeds on the roots of a wild plantation settings, the palm hibiscus plant. e threat of spread competes for water and nutrients to neighbouring countries therefore with the plants of the ‘understorey’ appears to be small. (the grasses, small herbs and shrubs constantly regenerating between the Fungus diseases of the coconut palms). In village and smallholder plantings, there is often an ‘overstorey’ Bud rot, a fatal disease of coconut, is of tall tree species competing with caused by the fungus Phytophthora the palm for an aerial resource— palmivora, which has developed interceptible sunlight. many strains in separate populations around the world. e disease is e plantation floor under highly most destructive when a coconut productive young palms is best variety from a region in which kept clear of dense understorey bud rot is rare is established in the vegetation, which might otherwise ‘territory’ of another strain of the consume scarce water and nutrient disease. When coconut hybrids that supplies. At the same time, it is not had a West African parent were a good idea to have bare soil beneath established in South-East Asia, bud the palms; this risks serious water Figure 5-2. Cocoa growing beneath rot sometimes devastated them. erosion, at least on steep terrain. a coconut stand in Ivory Coast. is shade-loving tree takes advantage Several other fungal pathogens Where nuts are collected from the of the light transmitted through the attack the leaves of coconut, ground for processing, vegetation coconut canopy. (Roland Bourdeix, especially in very moist climatic may be kept short either by hand Centre for International Cooperation zones. ey are usually more of a or machine slashing or chemical in Agricultural Research for problem during the nursery phase, weeding, or by grazing animals, Development (CIRAD), France)

67 ‘intercrops’ will depend very much When the maximum temperature Over such a long lifespan, it will face on the density and vigour of the exceeds 36°C, and daytime relative potentially fatal natural hazards, coconut palms, which determine the humidity falls below 20% for an such as strong winds (in some amount of light transmitted through extended period, the fruit suffers latitudes, cyclones, typhoons or the upper canopy. premature desiccation as a result of hurricanes occur yearly), floods, severe water deficit within the palm prolonged droughts, lightning strikes, Competition for light from and direct evaporation from the volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, neighbouring palms and other trees fruit. It appears that development landslides and tsunamis. A cyclone in the upper canopy affects coconut of the fruit is terminated early, or a volcanic eruption can destroy production in proportion to its resulting in loss of potential many palms in one event, while a intensity. A heavily shaded coconut production. Irrigation cannot fully powerful lightning strike can ‘take palm will not flower until it achieves overcome this problem, as the out’ 20 or more palms in a plantation more-or-less complete exposure of evaporative demand at the surface setting. Palms that can withstanding its crown to direct sunlight for much of the developing fruits exceeds the a severe cyclone cannot survive the of the day. Whilst shaded, it will capacity of the palm to deliver water onslaught of a tsunami as high as the direct its resources into rapid growth to meet the evaporation needs of crown: the tsunami that struck the of its trunk and lean away from the both fruit and fronds. northern Papua New Guinea coast most shaded sector. is is nature’s at Sissano, west of Wewak, in the way of hastening the emergence of Fruit maturing in the season of late 1990s destroyed palms under the crown into a more sunlit space. higher humidity (during the wet 15 metres tall. season) will develop normally, Low humidity endangers provided it has not been damaged ere is really no management fruit by the stress that often precedes the procedure capable of providing arrival of the wet season. protection against such awesome Atmospheric humidity in coconut hazards, except avoidance of homelands is always high, Physical hazards during locations most exposed to volcanic varying from close to saturation the palm’s life eruptions, cyclones or tsunamis overnight down to around 50% on (lightning, notoriously, may strike warm, clear days. e palm, and e coconut has a very long virtually anywhere). e age range particularly its developing fruit, are potential lifespan, exceeding 80 at which coconut palms are most stressed by low relative humidity, productive years—although at 50 susceptible to cyclone damage is which is not uncommon during years its productivity is usually less from five to 20 years: between these the dry season in many subcoastal than half of its peak performance ages, the trunk will not be long habitats, reaching an extreme in between 15 and 30 years of age, and enough to shed wind by flexing north-east Africa and north-west a steady decline continues after that. efficiently, and the root system (at Australia (see Figure 1-12).

68 least in the early years) will not be taken up from an acid soil than e traditional belief in many sufficiently developed to anchor the from an alkaline soil. Knowing the coconut cultures, that salt is entire base of the palm to the soil. soil pH becomes more important important for the good health of if the level in the soil of a trace the palm, appears to be confirmed. Eventually, coconut palms must be element, such as any of the five just Apart from supplying the chlorine replaced. Yields will decline, deaths mentioned, is very low. that the palm needs, salt can also will open gaps in the plantation, or be used as a short-term substitute the extreme height of urban palms e coconut is particularly for potassium fertiliser, with the might endanger people or structures. interesting among crop plants because of its unusually high e earlier-producing, higher- requirement for chlorine. Even yielding Dwarf–Tall hybrids planted though the palm evolved in an in some modern plantations begin environment where chlorine was to decline in yield after 25–30 years; readily available from salt (sodium managers may have to begin replacing chloride, NaCl) in sea-spray and these hybrids much earlier than Talls in seawater washing over some of in order to maintain profitability. its roots at high tide, it has only limited tolerance for salinity in Soil: pH, nutrients and the groundwater. e permanent salinity presence of more than 2000 parts e coconut palm requires an per million of salt (about one adequate supply of the usual set of sixteenth the concentration in sea essential plant mineral nutrients water) severely checks coconut in order to grow rapidly and be growth, but the palm can withstand productive. It is a particularly heavy brief periods of exposure to much Figure 5-3. Signs of salt spray damage user of potassium, which is needed higher salinity. For example, on palm leaves close to the beach, for the development of the fibrous irrigation with saline water close on the east coast of Cape York husk and is also concentrated in the to half the strength of seawater is Peninsula, Australia. e fronds on nut water. reported to have relieved water stress during extreme dry conditions in the left side of each palm show Soil pH (the measure of acidity or West Africa. However, this occurred greater damage than those on the alkalinity) affects the uptake of some on a coarse-textured soil from which right due to greater exposure of the nutrients, in so far as the elements salt would usually be leached during under side of their leaftlets, whipped boron, manganese, iron, zinc and the wet season, preventing harmful up by the salt-laden wind. e copper (all required only in very accumulation. upper surface of coconut leaflets is small amounts) are more readily protected by a waxy layer.

69 sodium temporarily preventing the proportions 8N:1P:16K. Give one or more of the trace elements the development of symptoms of each palm 200 g in year 1, increasing boron, molybdenum, copper, zinc, potassium deficiency. by 200 g each year to 600 g in year 3 iron and manganese. Aim to avoid and thereafter, which is equivalent the development of deficiency Sea-spray on the palm leaf to approximately 1.2 kg of fertiliser symptoms in coconut palms, mixture. Supply chlorine in the form because correction, using fertiliser, Coconut leaves can also be of muriate of potash (potassium takes up to two years to restore full damaged by sea spray, which is shed chloride), in which almost 50% by productivity. successfully from the waxy upper weight is chlorine. Apply sulfur surface of the leaflets but causes Trace element problems often arise (which is present as calcium desiccation of the unprotected cells when there is an extreme of soil sulfate in superphosphate, or in of the lower surface. When the alkalinity or acidity. If you suspect ammonium sulfate) in the amount palm is located very near the beach, a nutrient deficiency, foliar (leaf ) of 70 g/palm/year while symptoms which is the natural home of the analysis can be a useful tool to of deficiency last, to achieve best wild coconut, strong wind showers quickly confirm a visual diagnosis. growth and production. it with fine sea-spray. As the fronds Whereas soil analysis can provide whip about, the spray can cover the From year 6 onwards, the dose of a general knowledge of soil pH, undersurface of the leaflets, resulting nitrogen can be reduced and possibly organic matter, phosphorus, sulfur, in a greyish, ‘burnt’ appearance. dropped. Monitor phosphorus chlorine and cation reserves, visual needs using leaf analysis. Maintain symptoms and foliar analysis Fertiliser needs in potassium through split applications monitor how successfully the plant Australia (early and midway in the wet extracts and uses the essential season), and perhaps increase it nutrients. In Australia, almost all non-volcanic to between 500 g and 1 kg per soils are deficient in phosphorus, palm if rainfall conditions are Visual foliage guide: which should be a component of any very favourable and productivity symptoms and nutrients fertiliser mix used on coconut palms. exceeds 2 tonnes per hectare of oil e foliage indicates some of the Mixtures commonly comprise equivalent. Two tonnes oil equivalent more common nutrient deficiencies half their weight of the ‘active equals 3 tonnes of dried kernel, or through colour variations from the ingredients’ intended to be applied. about 15,000 nuts/ha. e balance is either elements such normal dark green, and through as oxygen that are not nutrients, or Depending on soil type, high some changes in frond appearance, nutrients such as calcium that are productivity often requires as summarised in Table 5.1. not commonly deficient. A balanced the application of magnesium mix will contain N (nitrogen), P and/or calcium (also supplied in (phosphorus) and K (potassium) in superphosphate), and occasionally

70 Table 5.1. Visual symptoms of some common nutrient deficiencies in the coconut

Deficiency Symptoms: leaflet colour variation or abnormal shape of frond/leaflet N—nitrogen Pale overall, especially the newly emerged fronds (Fig 5-4). P—phosphorus Poor growth. Yellowish lower fronds. K—potassium Older fronds orange/yellow as K withdrawn into younger growth; frequently a coloured band of aligned brown spots on each side of the midrib of the leaflet (Fig 5-5). Mg—magnesium Paleness (yellow) of whichever half of leaflet more exposed to sunlight. S—sulfur All fronds bright yellowish/orange (Fig 5-6). Cl—chlorine Older fronds ‘collapse’ early during water deficit (drought). B—boron Severe case (‘little leaf’) shows distorted, shortened frond emerging; mild case (‘hook leaf’) shows ‘folding’ of leaflet edge. Fe—iron Found in alkaline soils (coral gravel); intense yellow leaf of older fronds, while frond rachis (midrib) remains green (Fig 5-7). Mn—manganese Often in tandem with Fe; difficult to tell apart. Cu—Copper On peat soil; tip and edges of leaflet ‘burnt’ adjacent to a yellow zone grading gradually back to pale green near midrib. Water deficit General wilted look; older fronds collapse around the trunk; extremes of leaflets have ‘burnt’ look; petiole weakened.

Source: Foale, M.A 2003. e coconut palm. In: Chopra, V.L. (ed.), Handbook on industrial crops. New York, Haworth Press.

Where there is an abnormal leaf. When the value for a nutrient appearance, the cause of which is lower than that shown here, cannot be clearly diagnosed using investigate further. e frond Table 5.1, consider analysing the position in the table refers to a leaf tissue. Table 5.2 can be used mature palm; in young palms, the as a guide to the non-deficient 6th-youngest leaf may be sampled. concentration (or critical level) of mineral elements in the coconut

71 5-5

5-6 5-4

Figures 5-4 to 5-7. Symptoms of mineral nutrient deficiency: nitrogen (5-4), potassium (5-5), sulfur (5-6) and iron (5-7). (Phil Southern (sulfur), and Centre for International Cooperation in Agricultural Research for Development (CIRAD), France)

5-7

72 Table 5.2. Critical levels for mineral elements in the coconut leaf

Concentration of ‘major’ elements in leaflets of 14th-youngest frond of mature palms in production (% of dry matter) N—nitrogen 1.80 to 2.00 (2.2 in Tall × Dwarf hybrid) P—phosphorus 0.12 K—potassium 0.80 to 1.00 (1.4 in Tall × Dwarf hybrid) Mg—magnesium 0.20 to 0.30 (strong inverse sensitivity to extremes of K) Ca—calcium 0.30 to 0.50 (some inverse sensitivity to extremes of K) Na—sodium Not essential (temporarily useful when K is deficient) Cl—chlorine 0.50 to 0.60 S—sulfur 0.15 to 0.20 Concentration of trace elements in leaflets of the 14th-youngest frond (parts per million) B—boron 10 Mn—manganese >30 (difficult to fix a value; very interactive with Fe in strongly alkaline soil; potentially toxic in extremely acid soil) Fe—iron > 50 (deficient in strongly alkaline soils and in peat) Cu—copper 3 to 7 (deficiency found on peat soil) Mo—molybdenum 0.15 (a common value—no response observed yet) Zn—zinc 15 (a common value—no response observed yet) Al—aluminium >38 (not an essential element but always present; potentially toxic at values well in excess of this common level)

Source: Modified from Plantation crops, with the permission of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research.

73 e values in Table 5.2 are for the mature palm in a tropical environment, and might need to be modified in the light of experience in subtropical climates. Where more than one element falls outside the indicated ‘sufficiency’ range, it is wise to perform tests with different fertiliser nutrients. is is because a deficiency in one nutrient can cause poor uptake of others that would not otherwise be deficient. Seek professional help to test the response to different added nutrients in such a case. Tissue analysis is expensive; resort to it only after visual symptoms, local knowledge and fertiliser application tests have proved inconclusive.

74 chapter 6 e productive palm potential profit or hazard?

e farmer or householder eagerly awaits the fruit, then consumes it or adds value and delivers it to the market. e manager of a public space or resort, on the other hand, must eliminate the risk to passers-by from falling fruit. In either situation, competent harvesters are needed. e backyard grower consumes most home production by harvesting either drinking nuts or mature nuts. ose with access to many palms have the opportunity to profit from a number of value- adding options.

75 First fruits: harvest or as many. e lone palm does well Harvesting young palms damage control? because it is not shaded by other trees or palms and therefore intercepts full Young palms can usually offer When the young coconut palm first sunlight, which determines growth more opportunities for diverse begins to bear fruit, the reaction of rate and yield. e palm owner or products, because of the ease of the owner or manager will depend manager with a plan to use the fruit harvesting their fruit. For several very much on the purpose for which will welcome high productivity years, a harvester can remove fruit the palm was planted. e would-be and, unless they are operating only from Dwarf palms (such as the one producer, whether that person is a to supply their household (see in Figure 6-1) whilst standing on backyard enthusiast or smallholder Chapter 9), will turn their attention the ground, making it inexpensive farmer, joyfully sees some potential to processing and marketing the fruit. to collect drinking nuts, for which return for the effort of managing Dwarfs are a particularly good and fertilising the palm, and in some source. Harvesting Tall palms cases protecting it against natural usually calls for a ladder right from hazards. On the other hand, where the start, and within ten years from the palm was planted primarily as an first harvest the fruit may be hanging ornamental, the production of fruit five or six metres above the ground. will not necessarily be welcomed, and indeed might signal the need Harvesting can also be done using a prevent the hazard of falling fruit. pole and hook-knife, but care must be taken to prevent drinking nuts Potential yield falling more than a few metres to the ground and splitting on impact A single palm growing well apart (layers of fronds can cushion the from or towering above other fall). Mature fruit, on the other palms or trees in a garden, public hand, benefits from the shock park or street may become highly absorbency of the partially dried productive. If the soil is deep and husk and is rarely damaged, even fertile or well fertilised, if rainfall or when it falls from a great height. irrigation is frequent, and if there Figure 6-1. A highly productive is no appreciable cool season, the young palm on which the heavy Where the coconut is a traditional annual production of a freestanding bunches are weighing down the part of life, climbing skill is coconut palm can be as high as 200 older fronds. (Roland Bourdeix, developed from an early age— fruits. A small-fruited variety might Centre for International Cooperation especially by young men (but in yield more than this, while a large- in Agricultural Research for some cultures, young women as fruited one will produce perhaps half Development (CIRAD), France) well), who can rapidly harvest fruit

76 from a palm with a 10-metre trunk. nuts from palms too tall for the Climbers can also keep the coconut In India, a climbing-frame device harvesting hook. ey are able to crown free of dead fronds, old flower (Figure 6-3) has been developed leap from crown to crown, working stalks and any damaged, immature that allows anyone, even the merely very rapidly. fruit. A clean crown is less likely to moderately fit, to climb the palm be visited by marauding rats. without damage to the trunk, and e most accomplished climbers to have both hands free to perform are found among people who tasks at the height of the fruit collect toddy, which is the fresh bunches. Monkeys have been trained sap liberated at the cut end of the in some countries, such as Indonesia unopened flower sheath (see Chapter and Sri Lanka, to harvest mature 8). A palm that is being tapped for toddy must be climbed twice daily to change the collecting vessel, so the climber often constructs a ‘ladder’ by chopping shallow notches into the trunk at suitable spacings.

Figure 6-2. A young man climbing a Tall coconut palm on Rennell Figure 6-3. A simple and effective Island. Skill, stamina and strength two-piece climbing frame invented are required to perform this feat, in India, which enables anyone of Figure 6-4. No particular fitness or especially on older palms, which moderate strength to gain access to climbing skill is needed to climb a achieve a great height. the crown of a coconut palm. palm assisted by the climbing frame.

77 Beware: falling fruits attracts the attention of the media, citizens, especially children, are inducing a perception that such often not fully aware of the danger e size and weight of a mature injuries are commonplace. ere is of a falling coconut fruit. Figure fruit varies from 600 g to 3 kg however, more risk at tourist resorts 6-5 amusingly conveys the sort of between different types of palm. and in the parks of cities where scenario that unwary tourists might Fruit is usually larger on Talls than ‘coconut consciousness’ is low and encounter. on Dwarfs, and its size often varies according to the ‘load’ or number of fruits in the bunch. e fruits of a particular palm maintain a very similar shape and colour, varying only in size when there are more or fewer fruit in the bunch.

A large fruit, falling more than five metres, can seriously injure or kill humans or other creatures. Mature fruits are most likely to be released when the palm is shaken by the wind, but can also fall without warning, especially when there has been little wind for a few weeks. e damage done to an immature fruit, small or large, by a feeding rat will usually bring it down. e high moisture content of the husk at the immature stage makes a large fruit heavy and particularly dangerous.

e incidence of serious injury from falling fruit in coconut countries Figure 6-5. Hi-jinks on as hammock stretched between two palms loaded is low because local people are with ripe coconut fruits will surely end in disaster, as depicted on this Minties well aware of the risk, and have a wrapper. Minties is the name of popular confection available in Australia. seemingly instinctive ability to avoid e wrappers present many hilariously stressful scenes suggesting that this the hazard. e iconic or cartoon- confection would provide some relief for the unfortunate individual(s) shown in like aspect of falling coconuts the sketch. (Jeremy for DESIGN lab)

78 tube pole. More skill is required for taller palms, which in some parts of the world are harvested in this way up to a height of 18 metres. Using such a long pole is very difficult and not practical outside a plantation environment. In city parks and streets, and in back yards, specialist climbers or mechanical ‘cherry pickers’ are needed for Tall palms.

Indigenous harvesting skills Some Australian city councils contract specialist coconut harvesters, who climb the palm with various types of rigging, often using spiked boots to grip the trunk. e spikes damage the trunk, leaving permanent gouge marks that increase the risk of long-term Figure 6-5a. A less likely disaster wrought by a falling fruit on a desert island, deterioration: the palm trunk cannot preventing the transmission of the SOS message. (Jeremy for DESIGN lab) repair itself. In ‘coconut villages’, on the other Harvesting for production productive lives (around 6–8 years hand, every able-bodied male, and in some cultures many females, have and to reduce hazard of age) while Dwarf palms may be 12–18 years old before they pose a developed the required skills and If human traffic beneath a palm similar danger. strength from childhood. Some cannot be avoided, precautions are climbers place their feet into a When the fruit bunch is no more needed to prevent fruit-fall once the strong, 400-mm loop of vines, spun than five metres above the ground, a fruit bunches are more than three rope or the cloth of a lap-lap, which bunch can easily be pruned off using metres from the ground. Palms of provides grip by wrapping part way a curved, sickle-bladed hook knife, the Tall varieties mostly exceed that around the trunk, and secures the mounted on a bamboo or metal- height from the beginning of their feet on opposite sides of the trunk.

79 e climber holds the trunk with Rats can make fruits fall marketable for both food and drink, both arms and draws their feet up but requires more frequent visits by so that their body is in a squatting Where common rats are expected the harvester. position. ey then straighten to attack immature fruits, causing In such a situation, the Dwarf their legs, which moves their body their untimely fall, the manager will palm is an attractive alternative upward, while their arms maintain be forced to program more visits to because it needs very little ‘protective’ their grip on the trunk and the remove any potentially dangerous harvesting in the first 15 years of loop around their feet keeps its fruit. Rat access can be reduced by life, and it develops the attractive grip. e climber moves their arms fitting a slippery metal ‘skirt’ around spherical crown shape by about its higher, preparing for the next leg the trunk, comprising for example sixth year. Orange and yellow-fruited movement. In Micronesia, strong a light gauge (1.2-mm) rectangular Dwarfs also have a pleasing pale toddy harvesters appear to ‘walk’ up aluminium sheet 700 mm wide and green to yellow foliage colour. the palm trunk without the aid of a long enough to wrap fully around the trunk to be secured with nails loop, assisted sometimes by shallow Profiting from fruit foot notches cut into the trunk to at the overlap. If rats can get access increase grip. to the crown from neighbouring removal structures or large fruit trees, such as e most mature bunch taken down Whether the climber is a villager mango, control will be more difficult. or an urban contractor, harvesting by the once-a-year harvester will unwanted bunches in urban centres have fully developed kernel, while Fruit removal changes the the least mature but still full-sized and at tourist resorts usually involves look of the palm a precautionary cleanup of all those fruits will contain only nut water bunches carrying fruits of full size, Reduction of the fruit load in this (also known as ‘coconut juice’). Fruits which means the six most advanced way has a downside, however, of intermediate maturity will contain bunches. Two harvesting visits per because the palm now has energy ample juice and jelly-like ‘flesh’, which year, or a complete removal of all to spare and it uses this to extend becomes firmer and thicker as the bunches (including the youngest) on its trunk. e palm grows tall fruits approach full maturity. ese a single yearly visit, ensures that few faster, and the shape of the crown is fruits all have potential commercial fruits of full size are ever likely to adversely affected: it retains the less value, providing very enjoyable food fall, and thereby greatly reduces the attractive inverted-cone or ‘feather and drink, and attract the lively risk to the visiting public. duster’ look of a much younger interest of visitors. All but the fully palm. If the more usual, open, mature fruits have a fairly short spherical appearance of the crown is shelf-life, however, losing their fresh important in the particular setting, flavour within three to four days only two or three bunches should be unless refrigerated. pruned per visit. is yields fruits

80 Where there is ready access to a a light wire loop. is prevents any Palms that carry a full fruit load to tourist market, it makes sense to fruit from falling, and allows the marketable size, whether the fruit is protect the unripe fruit against rat harvester to visit when fruits have harvested for drinking or for mature damage, and where falling fruits reached their most valuable stage for kernel, will retain the desirable and create a hazard, it is wise to install the local market. e cage, which iconic spherical crown. a means of preventing uncontrolled is reusable, is made by folding a falls. A flexible wire-netting cage 1200 mm × 600 mm rectangle of Fresh mature nuts have a shelf-life big enough to fit around a bunch wire netting (50-mm mesh), and of two months or more, and so can of about ten full-sized fruits can be securing the two opposite sides be left uncollected until the whole installed on each immature bunch with tie-wire (or the ring fasteners bunch, or even two successive and attached to the base of a frond used with special pliers by fencing bunches, are ready. Drinking nuts higher up in the palm crown with contractors). have a shorter shelf-life and should be used within a few days of harvest, unless stored in a coldroom. e water contained in a mature nut is a pleasant drink, too, but usually has a lower ‘refreshment’ rating than the water of an immature fruit, at least among experienced consumers.

ere are many claims that coconut water has medicinal uses (it is recommended for liver ‘flushing’, which supposedly clears stones from the gall bladder) or stimulatory effects (probably due to its sugar content) when drunk, and these help to promote sales.

By-products for fuel and thatching

Figure 6-6. A wire mesh basket holding coconut fruit. Such baskets could be In the urban or home garden slipped over each of several young bunches when the palm crown is visited by situation, the fronds and fruit stalks the maintenance crew, ensuring that no ‘rogue’ fruit breaks loose endangering of the coconut palm must be dealt the passer-by. e basket also provides protection against rats. with. e frond stem of Tall varieties

81 is usually four to six metres long, including its thick, fleshy base (the petiole, up to the first leaflets) and its long, slender main axis (the rachis, which carries the leaflets). A dried frond falling from a tall palm is less dangerous than a falling fruit, but still constitutes a hazard.

Municipal workers trim older fronds from palms when harvesting fruits. It is important not to prune fronds that are still fully green and therefore actively supporting the growth of the palm, but fronds hanging down almost vertically contribute almost nothing. A frond normally has a life of two years, which means that Figure 6-7. Basket making with coconut fronds for use as seedling containers in a palm carries about double the a plantation nursery. is ‘home-grown’ solution to the scarcity of poly-bags number of fronds that is produced on remote Christmas Island (central Pacific) typifies the creative use of coconut in one year. e rate of frond palm resources in indigenous cultures. production varies from 16 per year in a tropical climate, such as the stem is often used in fencing, packed Wherever the sago palm frond is New Guinea coast, to 8 per year on closely together and supported by available in Melanesia, it is used in the southern coast of Queensland at pairs of wires or fine ropes. Bunch preference to the coconut frond, latitude 28 degrees south. stalks, and the sheath that protected because it lasts twice as long. the unopened flower, are also used In coconut villages, green fronds as fuel. In some villages, where are harvested to provide leaflets for there is no alternative thatch that is weaving baskets and hats. Fairly more durable, the coconut frond is young fronds are normally used, used on the roof and in wall panels. because the leaflets on older fronds Figure 4-3 (Chapter 4) shows a often have blemishes from the woven coconut tent used as shade to attacks of insects or fungi. e thick protect a young seedling. frond base becomes useful fuel for the cooking fire, while the long frond

82 chapter 7 e fruit and its parts

Coconut water is one of the world’s most popular and valuable natural drinks. Coconut kernel and its many derivatives have an immense potential benefit in the human diet, giving energy and sustaining good health. e husk provides a durable fibre for mat and rope making. e shell is especially energy-dense and hard, making it a valuable fuel and a long-lasting material for tools, ornaments and curios.

83 Legacies of evolution ere is usually a slight taste of is great increase in the size of coconut oil, due to a trace suspended nuts provided larger ‘bottles’ of Fossil shells of a coconut ancestor in the water. this natural beverage, for use when found in New Zealand, once a land fresh water was scarce at home, Under natural conditions, water fragment attached to the ancient and especially on sea voyages: H.C. evaporates from the nut cavity supercontinent of Gondwana, reveal Harries has referred to the coconut through the kernel and shell as a smaller nut, well outside the range fruit in poetic language as ‘the milk time passes, and the remaining nut of most modern forms. bottle on the doorstep of mankind’ water becomes more concentrated. (see Figure 1-7). After the dispersal of coconut seeds It is likely that when the ancestors across the ocean, their successful of present-day human populations Small nuts are still important in germination on a sandy or gravelly reached coconut shores, probably the drink supply in many places, surface probably depends on some within the past 100 000 years or however, because there was no water being left inside the nut. Larger so, they began to select for larger particular motivation among non- nuts hold more water, so natural coconut fruit to get a higher seafarers to select for really large nuts selection would increase fruit size and yield of delicious and refreshing purely for local drink supplies. e water content. is increase in water coconut water. e change in fruit convenience of the Dwarf varieties content would also allow the fruit to characters brought about after many for harvesting and their relative travel even further on its sea voyage generations of such selection is safety around the village led to their and remain viable (see Figure 1-7). referred to as ‘domestication’. adoption as the preferred types.

e coconut seed is almost unique Wild-type palms bear Large fruits were carried in the plant kingdom for its large small fruit far quantity of water, which also happens to be an excellent drink Small-fruited palms, which are Tall palms bearing large fruits for humans. Nut water usually found these days mostly on remote are found on many islands in contains enough sugars to be sweet uninhabited islands, such as North the tropical Pacific colonised by to the taste, as well as the plant Keeling in the Cocos group in the Polynesian voyagers between 1500 growth stimulants needed to initiate Indian Ocean, weigh 600 g to 1 kg and 4000 years ago. Because the germination of the seed. If the water at maturity and contain only 50– immature fruit has a short ‘shelf life’, is evaporated in a laboratory oven, 100 mL of water. e largest fruits of their great seafaring canoes would it leaves a residue equal to 3–4% of ailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, have been stocked with the mature the original weight. In a medium- Indonesia and Polynesia are all fruit. It would have supplied food sized nut with a 500-mL cavity, this advanced examples of domesticated and drink for months, if necessary, amounts to 15–20 g of solids— fruit, weighing around 3 kg and without spoilage. At the end of mostly sugar and some protein. yielding 1 L or more of water. such voyages, unused nuts would

84 have provided the foundation for Large fruit for high yield, ocean currents, prevailing wind and a strain of coconut distinct from small fruit for natural any land in its way. Of course, many the wild type, which had already dispersal nuts, launched on their floating spread naturally to the new habitat. voyages by the quirks of storm and Cross-pollination between old and e evolution of the popular large tide, probably return to shore on new palms would have given rise drinking nut within the coconut their landmass of origin within a few to crossbred palms bearing fruit of fruit has coincidentally increased kilometres of their starting points. intermediate size. kernel production. ere has Nuts from the smallest and most been a fourfold increase in the It would have been very difficult for isolated islands and atolls probably amount of mature kernel (‘meat’ voyaging peoples to colonise most have the greatest chance of travelling or solid endosperm) found in the new lands that did not already have a long distance. Within the span of largest nuts. When it comes to a wild coconut population capable human occupation of coconut lands, seed dispersal, such large seeds are of supporting them from the time of isolated coconut populations were disadvantaged in comparison to the arrival. Easter Island in the south-east the least likely to have been affected smallest ‘ancestor-type’ nuts. Pacific is an exception, as it was settled by domestication because they successfully without the coconut To remain viable and travel far occupied too small an area to attract (which would have been unproductive on the ocean, the coconut fruit purposeful rather than accidental at latitude 27 degrees south). depended on buoyancy provided human settlement. Not surprisingly, by its thick fibrous husk and, to a therefore, palms on the most isolated ere is evidence on many islands lesser extent, by the small air volume islands exhibit the ‘wildest’ traits, in Polynesia that persistent selection within the fresh mature nut. e being those most favourable to by the new colonisers brought husk comprises fibres separated by successful dissemination by sea. about eventual dominance of the a bulky filler material known as pith introduced fruit type over the local or cortex, which dries down to low Nut water as a fresh local palm population. Outstanding density at maturity. e whole fruit product examples of such large-fruited is encased in an almost impervious populations are found on Samoa, While a diverse range of products outer ‘skin’, which admits water only Rotuma in the Fijian Islands, can be derived from the three solid slowly. Rennell in Solomon Islands, and the components of the coconut fruit Markham Valley and KarKar Island e nut has been found to remain (kernel, husk, shell), coconut water in Papua New Guinea. Similar large viable (that is, to retain its ability presents fewer possibilities and is fruits are also present on Mindanao to germinate) after four months mostly consumed directly as a thirst- in the southern Philippines, in parts floating in seawater. is is long quencher and moderate stimulant. of Malaysia, in Indonesia and in enough for it to travel several ailand. thousand kilometres, depending on

85 However, coconut water varies A spherical nut of 130-mm internal coconut milk, an emulsion extracted through stages of fruit maturity, diameter holds a maximum of from the mature kernel. Water beginning with the six-month- 1150 mL of nut water (before from immature fruits is extremely old fruit. At this age, the fruit has any kernel develops), compared popular direct from the nut and is reached its full size but there is no to 550 mL in a nut of 100-mm also marketed in containers labelled kernel or air inside the nut, simply diameter. Gradually, over the ensuing ‘coconut juice’. water containing solutes and some six months, kernel accumulates on suspended (cloudy) matter. e water the inside wall of the shell, at first e shelf-life of immature fruits is reputed to taste best when the taking the form of soft jelly and then is limited to about a week unless fruit is six to nine months old (fruit becoming rubbery by ten months they are refrigerated; the mature would be mature at 12 months) but and solidly crisp when mature at the fruit, and the nut extracted from the concentration of sugar and other end of the twelfth month. it by dehusking, last either until ingredients varies greatly, perhaps germination, following which No detailed description of changes because the water is a temporary the remaining water is absorbed in the composition of nut water store for nutrients being deposited into the spongy haustorium (see during this period is available, into the kernel. At nine months, the Chapter 3), or until the all the but folk who drink nut water kernel comprises a nutritious soft water has evaporated out through regularly are able to recognise early, jelly, which is easily scooped out. the kernel and shell. During this intermediate and ‘old’ flavours. At time, the nut might be invaded maturity, slow evaporative water by microorganisms, which gain loss from the nut begins. Airspace access through the minute pores in the nut can be detected from in the shell that admit fibre-borne a sloshing sound when the fruit nutrients from the ‘mother’ palm, is shaken. is loss of water or through the nut’s ‘soft eye’. e concentrates the dissolved or microbes attack the water and kernel suspended compounds, so water within, destroying their flavour. from mature fruits often becomes If the nut escapes such an attack, increasingly sweet during storage. which is more likely in a dry climate where the loss of nut water is rapid, Confusing water and milk the kernel may remain uninfected until it dries out, forming ‘ball copra’. Figure 7-1. Fruit being sold for In countries far from the coconut drinking of the nut water, in Vietnam. heartland, confusion arises when ere is much traditional mythology Visitors to most coconut regions the clear water from within the surrounding mature coconut will be able to partake of this most nut is referred to as ‘milk’. Below, water, and modern science bears refreshing of drinks. we examine the preparation of true some of it out. e water carries

86 traces of many minerals, such as of the coconut kernel, human Traditional coconut cream potassium and sodium, as well as survival on the dozens of inhabited and milk preparation ‘growth substances’. e trigger atolls across the Pacific and Indian for germination of the embryo oceans would not have been possible. To make coconut milk, the person embedded in the kernel may well preparing food for the indigenous It appears that the short-chain come from the water within, household takes a dehusked nut, fatty acids of coconut oil not only initiating the development of the cracks it in half, and scrapes the provide ample energy with no risk spongy haustorium that nourishes kernel from the inside of each of obesity, but they also enhance the the tiny seedling by transferring hemisphere. e preferred tool is a physiological activity of the essential nutrients from the kernel. Nut water round-ended metal ‘comb’ with short fats found in fish. In the era before is widely used as a tool in plant teeth that shred the soft kernel. e urbanisation, health professionals, science to stimulate cell division in cook places the shreds into a bowl in as well as early European navigators, tissue taken from many plant species which has been laid a piece of coarse noted the remarkably robust e active cell-stimulating molecule cloth, and adds water, which is physique and general good health in coconut water is one of a group of often hot. ey then draw the cloth of indigenous coastal peoples chemicals known as cytokinins. around the kernel and squeeze hard, consuming a coconut diet. using a rolling action at either end of Coconut cream and A description in 1695 by the English the bundle. In some places, the cook coconut milk buccaneer, global voyager and dispenses with the cloth and kneads author, William Dampier, of the and squeezes the mix of shreds and e kernel is especially important, uses of coconut in India shows that water with their bare hands. e as it has been a valuable item in traditional processing and use in the milk is collected in the bowl. the indigenous human diet of the tropics has changed little in three coconut heartland for countless More water can be added and the centuries. Dampier seems to have pulp squeezed again, yielding a milk millennia. Indigenous people mainly been most impressed, however, by use it as coconut milk, the emulsion of less ‘strength’ that the one before. the immature coconut as a source of e first extract (which is richest) can squeezed from finely shredded fresh drink and soft kernel: kernel. is is added, for flavour be considered ‘coconut cream’; later, enhancement, to starch dishes such While it is young and soft like Pap, more dilute, extracts are ‘coconut milk’ some Men will eat it, scraping it as rice and the several root crops— e residue can be fed to poultry, with a spoon, after they have drunk sweet potato, taro, cassava, yams and the Water that was within it. I dogs or pigs, or added to other so forth—and to fish dishes, where like the water best when the nut is dishes. e cook will add the cream its flavour and high energy content almost ripe, for then it is sweetest or milk to whatever is being prepared are much valued. Without the and briskest. for the main meal, such as taro, sweet combination of fish and derivatives potato, yam, tapioca or rice.

87 Coconut cream, and the more dilute Coconut in your kitchen e simplest procedure in coconut coconut milk, are available in both cuisine is to add coconut milk, which canned and dehydrated formulations Coconut has long been used as a comes under many brand names in supermarkets around the world. vital, delicious ingredient in cakes in the supermarket, to a stir-fry Urban-dwelling indigenous people, and other sweet foods and as a vegetable dish, to rice after boiling, who have less time to prepare food compatible partner to chilli-spiced and to fried fish and meat dishes. than villagers, often use the canned dishes in traditional coconut rough experience, you will quickly or powdered forms for convenience. producing countries, such as India, determine the correct amount to suit Among expatriates in the tropics, and ailand and the Philippines. individual or family tastes. in developed countries, the number ese countries have produced a of cooks with a taste for curries plethora of recipe books featuring A search of the internet using and other exotic dishes that include the coconut. the word ‘coconut’ will find many coconut milk is on the increase. published recipe books. e kernel as food: solid or shredded

e kernel, consumed raw, is widely popular outside the tropics for its flavour, its oil content and its health benefits. It is a concentrated energy food, contains fibre and protein, and is ideal for children.

Desiccated coconut is produced from shredded or ground kernel that has been dried sufficiently to be preserved against the attacks of insects, bacteria and fungi, although some processors also add a sulphite as a precautionary preservative. is form of coconut kernel is ubiquitous in Australian kitchens, and essential for lamingtons (sponge Figure 7-2. A toothed mechanical device designed to speed up the shredding of cake coated with chocolate icing kernel from the nut. and rolled in shredded or ground

88 Coconut oil: a major Copra remained a major traded trading commodity commodity for a century or more. At around 5% moisture content, copra e other major product derived remains free from insect attack and from the kernel is coconut oil, chemical deterioration for many traditionally separated from coconut months. Traditionally, the kernel cream by heating to drive off the might be dried in the sun during water, or by allowing the cream to fine weather, or ‘smoke dried’ on the stand for up to 48 hours at about smallholder’s farm using coconut 25°C while fermentation causes shell and husk to heat the dryer. the oil to separate and float to the Both these traditional methods surface. produce a poor grade of copra. Coconut oil has a multitude of Modern small driers sometimes uses: as cooking oil and in all supplement the heat from the fire applications that call for shortening by using a thermal store, consisting Figure 7-3. Coconut milk being (the ingredient that makes pastry of a bed of large rocks in a shallow squeezed from the shredded kernel crisp); in body and hair lotions; pit beneath a glass sheet, which in the bare hand, in Mozambique. in medications for abrasions, skin accumulates heat from the sun Many consumers strain the milk rashes and burns; as lighting and and releases it when the fire is not through a coarse woven cloth. engine fuel oil; and as a feedstock for burning. Industrial plantations soaps and detergents. Coconut soap normally use firewood or fuel-oil desiccated coconut), cake toppings, is especially valued because it lathers driers. macaroons (desiccated coconut tolerably well with hard water and mixed with egg white and baked) even with seawater, unlike most Industrial processing of and ‘coconut ice’. It is also used other soaps. coconut oil widely in many commercially made A shortage of oil for household snack bars, including the well- Oil is extracted by passing shredded purposes in Europe, where modern known ‘Bounty’ bar, muesli mixes and heated copra through very soaps had been invented early in and the like. Similar candy products powerful presses. is yields the industrial revolution, initiated using coconut are popular in most up practically all the oil present, plantation-scale copra making in countries. amounting to more than 60% of the coconut countries. e copra (the dry weight of the feedstock. dried kernel of the nut) was taken to Europe, where the oil was extracted mechanically.

89 e residue of 35–40% has around Virgin coconut oil: a in a matrix of pith or cortex. e 20% protein and 10% residual oil valuable new product fibres can be separated from the content, and is known as organic cortex by combing after a hammer- ‘copra cake’ or ‘copra meal’. is ere is a growing demand for milling process, which softens the feedstuff has found a valuable niche virgin coconut oil (VCNO) for husk without breaking the fibres, or in the market for cattle feed, for quality cooking purposes, as a traditionally by retting (prolonged organic beef production, and horse health food and for medicinal use. soaking) in a pond. feed. In cattle, it delivers a similar VCNO is produced by several weight gain to feeds with a much processes, including drying freshly Coconut fibre (or ‘coir’, from the higher protein content. Working and shredded kernel to 12% moisture Malay kayar, for cord) is spun to racing horses show sustained energy content at moderate temperature, form yarn, which in turn is twisted and tend to lose some weight, which and immediately pressing out the oil. into durable ropes that match ropes also enhances performance. Only moderate pressure is required of other natural fibres for their ratio at this moisture content, whereas of strength to diameter. Coconut In developed countries, coconut copra (at 5–6% moisture) requires rope does not stretch or shrink in oil usually undergoes further both high temperature and very high water, unlike many synthetic fibre processing (known as RBD—refine, pressure to release its oil. ropes, and this outstanding stability bleach and deodorise) to remove makes it especially valuable in the undesirable flavours, colours and Another pathway to VCNO is via rigging of seagoing craft. Its use aromas associated with inadequate fermentation, in which microbial in coconut lands goes back many copra making. e oil remains an activity releases the oil, which floats thousands of years, and it is still important industrial feedstock for to the surface in 12–24 hours and much in demand internationally. the manufacture of soap, and in can be poured or skimmed off. recent decades the lauric oil present A little heat removes the small e raw fibres, varying in thickness in coconut and palm kernel has amount of residual moisture (see and strength, can be separated also found an important niche in Chapter 10). for different applications. Coarse the production of high-quality fibre is ideal for the durable coir detergents. Coconut oil has also Husk and fibre: versatile doormats traded worldwide. It is been used in developed countries raw materials also incorporated into rubberised for deep frying and other food slabs of fibre, manufactured in preparation methods from the early e coconut husk, which in nature several Asian countries and widely 1800s to the present. aids the protection and dispersal used in automobile upholstery. Finer of the seed and conducts nutrients fibre makes softer yarn, which is from the palm to the nut, consists used in attractive netting bags of all of a great many fibres of differing sizes. Soft fibres also form the basis length and thickness, embedded of magnificent tapestries and mats,

90 produced particularly in India and in thickness from light (2 mm) to used a large coconut shell to help Sri Lanka, featuring vivid colours heavy (6 mm), depending on the measure out the scanty fresh water and elaborate patterns. variety and vigour of the palm. supply. Strictly rationed water, some dry bread, and a quantity of e cortex material, combed away e shell has proved to be very coconuts in the boat enabled the when the fibres are extracted valuable in human economies. hapless band to survive for 40 days following hammer-milling, is Most importantly, it provides fuel and reach safety in Timor—one of biologically inert and valuable for for domestic cooking and heat for the great voyages of Pacific seafaring moisture retention in horticultural drying coconut kernel to produce in which the coconut played a potting mixes. copra and for drying fish to be significant role. Bligh’s coconut preserved. e brittle, high-density, e domesticated type of nut, with was auctioned by his descendants woody material of the shell is rich its much-reduced proportion of in London in 2002, for many in hydrocarbons and burns with a husk, yields much less fibre and thousands of dollars. cortex than the wild type, with its fierce heat. e coconut half-shell is very bulky husk. With controlled burning, coconut useful as a hand-held scraping tool shell can be converted to high- Coconut shell: fuel and in the food garden, and makes an quality charcoal, which is prized as efficient miniature scoop that fits toolmaking material a feedstock for making the activated comfortably in the human hand— e shell of the coconut serves as carbon needed in much industrial ideal for removing soil loosened a barrier to maintain the sterile chemistry. For example, activated with a crowbar when preparing a state of the kernel and water in the carbon is used in the separation post hole. seed. Before the half-mature stage of gold fragments from the waste material in pulverised gold ore. e attractive dark brown colour of of fruit development, the shell is polished coconut shell lends itself soft and thin, comprising sheets of e shell is also ground to a fine to a many ornamental and practical conducting fibres connected to the powder and used both for lubricating uses. Its hardness allows it to take a fibres in the husk. Subsequently, very paste for rock drills and as the fuel fine manual polish with sandpaper, dense deposits of lignin accumulate component in mosquito coils. after a preparation stage using a around the shell fibres, while water coarse powered disk to remove the In the traditional household and and nutrients continue to flow traces of fibre attached to the outer village, the half-shell is a valuable into the nut. e now hard and surface. e layer of compressed utensil to hold food and drink. brittle shell retains an inner lining fibres attached to the inner surface When Captain William Bligh was at maturity, consisting of a mat of is best removed with sandpaper cast adrift by the Bounty mutineers fibres, which eventually disconnects stretched over a dome-shaped tool. from the kernel. e shell varies off Tonga in 1789, in an open boat with some loyal crewmates, he

91 Polished shell is used to make artisans in coconut countries, e half-shell pieces can also be buttons and household utensils, limited only by their imaginations, fitted into each other to form a line including ladles, small bowls and fashion many other curios and of fuel, for example in the controlled drinking vessels, and a great variety practical articles from coconut shell. heating of a rack for drying coconut of ornaments. e wide range of In some communities, half-shells kernel or other fruit (Figure 7-4). shell sizes allows the production of serve as percussion instruments to Within a sheltered enclosure with cups, bowls and goblets. Creative accompany song and dance. a rack over the top, the shell line

Figure 7-5. Coconut knife, designed Figure 7-7. Hemispherical halves of with sufficient weight to crack open a mature nut ready for shredding or the dehusked nut and remove the slicing out of the kernel kernel in strips.

Figure 7-4. Coconut-shell fire comprising shells nested into each other. is arrangement gives a prolonged steady burn, consuming the line of shells at 30 cm per hour. is convenient heat source, practically smoke free, is used to dry Figure 7-8. A narrow strip of kernel coconut kernel yielding copra, and Figure 7-6. A dehusked mature nut extracted in a spiral configuration to dry other products that require a held ready to be cracked open using by working the coconut knife blade controlled situation. the coconut knife. around the edge of the half-nut.

92 is lit at one end (requiring coals that leaves the dried material more Coconut products from another fire, or kerosene or less free from smoke odour. available in Australia soaked into the first shell) and Depending on the space available, will burn progressively at the rate the line can be doubled back, or two e most familiar derivative of the of 30 centimetres (approximately or more lines of shells can be burned coconut fruit in Australian markets eight shells) per hour. e shell simultaneously for more heat. is is the bare-shelled nut. e husk has fire burns with a modest flame and process is widely used by coconut been removed, but there are usually emits only a little smoke, thereby farmers to dry copra laid on a slatted many loose fibres attached to the allowing a hot-air drying process rack about one metre above the fire. surface. A sharp blow on the ‘equator’ of the nut with a heavy-bladed knife usually succeeds in partly splitting it into two roughly equal sections. e water can be collected as the halves are fully separated, revealing the broken edges of the shell and the attached white kernel. Canned coconut cream, milk, ‘lite’ milk and juice are imported from many source countries and are readily available. e widely used mosquito coil incorporates ground coconut shell as the material that burns to release the insect repellant. Coconut fibre (coir) mats imported from India are common, as well as horticultural ‘mulch’ mats for soil-surface protection. e pith separated from the fibres is available Figure 7-9. Kernel from the ‘inside’ of the half-nut may be extracted in triangular in compressed briquettes for pieces using the coconut knife. incorporation into potting mixes as a medium to retain moisture. Specialty shops carry curios made from coconut shell, such as buttons, buckles, cups and goblets.

93 chapter 8 Abundant products health drink, liquor, structural components, shade, fuel and more

e coconut palm produces a great variety of products other than its fruit and nuts. e sap (or toddy) provides drink (sweet and rich in vitamins when fresh; alcoholic after fermentation) and sugar. e trunk is a valuable source of structural and ornamental timber. Fronds, flower sheaths, stems and branches have many potential uses. e frond is used in decoration, costume and headwear, and as light fencing material. e flower stem and sheath are useful domestic fuels.

94 Coconut sap for toddy day. If the palm is experiencing water is produced for some local markets, and sugar deficit, less sap will flow. e cut is and is also available under the name refreshed every morning and evening of arrack, for example in Sri Lanka. In many cultures, the sap (or toddy) for two to four weeks. of the palm is tapped for food and Sugar, which is extracted from fresh drink. Fresh toddy is a valuable Toddy is rich in sugar, vitamin C toddy by evaporation, has some source of vitamins in places where and some B vitamins, and makes an potential as a cash commodity fresh fruit and vegetables are scarce, excellent drink for children when where productivity is high. e high as well as being a feedstock for it is fresh. Coconut sugar contains cost of climbing to harvest toddy, the production of both palm wine mostly sucrose and can substitute twice daily, dictates that young and palm sugar. After a year or directly for cane sugar. Known in palms are very much preferred for so of tapping, during which fruit the coconut heartland as brown profitability. On a plantation scale, production ceases, toddy palms sugar or palm sugar, it has many the coconut can produce as much are usually rested for a while. food uses in local communities. For sugar per hectare as well-managed ere is commonly a growth example, Indonesia’s well-known sugarcane, and has the advantage reaction to the toddy phase, shown Bandrek drink, based on ginger, of being a fully perennial crop that by overproduction from several would be barely drinkable without can be redeployed to generate other bunches, which carry 50 or more added palm sugar. It is likely that products in response to market fruits each, resulting in some being human communities could not variations. On the negative side, sap extremely small and of little value. survive on isolated atolls without harvesting requires constantly higher using fresh toddy to avoid vitamin labour inputs. Toddy is harvested by cutting off deficiency, especially where rainfall is a slice of tissue from the tip of the marginal for growing fruit and green Uses for the frond spathe (the newly emerged but vegetables. not yet open sheath of the flower). Other components of the coconut Before the first slice, the spathe Fermentation of fresh toddy is palm provide valuable products is prepared for sap harvesting by rapid at tropical temperatures, in traditional villages. e frond coiling a fine rope around most of so that within a few hours of comprises a robust petiole its length to prevent the normal collection there is an appreciable (measuring about one quarter of splitting of the sheath that allows the build-up of alcohol, which can be the overall length and forming the inflorescence to emerge. A container delayed by refrigeration. Left for base portion attached to the trunk (bottle, bamboo tube or large shell) two days, toddy becomes a strong and the tapering section extending is hung from the end of the spathe alcoholic drink, which sometimes to the first leaflets) and the rachis to collect the flowing sap, which has a negative social impact in (or frond mid-rib) and its attached may amount to as much as a litre communities where it is widely leaflets. e frond of a mature Tall overnight and a little less during the consumed. Fortified alcoholic toddy palm is 5–7 metres long, while that

95 of a Dwarf may be 3–5 metres. of fence, wall and roof. One edge of e wood of the outer bulk of e petiole and rachis are useful the panel is usually held together the lower trunk of a mature palm as fuel, having a dry weight of naturally, by retaining a thin strip (over 25 years old) has achieved a 2–4 kilograms. When the rachis, from the side of the rachis. fairly high density (above 600 kg/ which is usually straight and rigid, is m3) through the progressive e pale yellow leaflets of the stripped of leaflets, it makes a useful accumulation of woody tissue. immature frond, cut before they light fence picket. Within this dense ‘tube’ is another unfold after emerging spear-like zone of wood of medium density Coconut leaflets are woven into at the top of the palm, are made temporary baskets, or into hats, into attractive dance costumes and mats, and panels for the cladding decorations in some indigenous cultures. In Bali, immature leaflets are available in many markets for use in day-to-day religious offerings.

Fuel from the old flower parts e dried-out sheath and skeleton of the inflorescence provide readily combustible fuel for domestic use in the traditional village. e sheath’s canoe-like shape makes it popular in children’s games, perhaps providing their first awareness of the buoyancy of a solid object on water.

Palm wood: strength and Figure 8-1. An inflorescence sheath beauty bound up for toddy tapping. Short e palm trunk is valuable as a raw Figure 8-2. A primitive drying rack for pieces of leaflet are attached vertically log for short-term bridge supports coconut kernel, made from lengths to guide the toddy into the shell in the village, and for sawn timber of frond rachis (stalk). e smoked vessel suspended below the freshly- provided that it is milled carefully copra from this process yields poor cut end. e ‘leaking’ end of the (see below). quality oil that needs to be refined, sheath is freshly cut (tapped) twice a bleached and deodorised before day, when the vessel is changed. industrial use.

96 (400–600 kg/m3), and finally In common with all other palms, Beyond 40 years of age, height there is a column of softer wood the coconut palm has a distinct increase diminishes further as fruit (200–400 kg/m3) at the core of the internode space on the trunk production takes greater priority. trunk. In the upper sixth of an older between the ‘ring of attachment’ of However, the density of the lower palm trunk, the high-density outer each successive frond. e result three-quarters—which extended tube is missing because this part is that the height of the coconut more rapidly in the first 40 years— of the trunk is relatively younger, trunk increases with each frond continues to increase for several and the inner zone of low density produced. In the young palm, the years, thereby raising the overall predominates. internodes are large: a young Tall- density and quality of the wood. type palm might grow one metre In contrast to the diminishing rate each year for a few years, but once of extension of trunk height, the fruit production begins the new trunk diameter remains more-or- internodes become smaller, with less constant for many metres. e annual height increase falling to just Tall palm’s trunk has a uniform a few centimetres in very old palms.

Figure 8-3. An ornamental house post prepared from a coconut trunk. e coconut log was infused with a special wax to impart stability before being machined into this Figure 8-4. A box carved from coconut wood, showing natural decorative dots cylindrical post. in cross-section and stripes when cut lengthways.

97 300–400 mm diameter above about can produce an ‘hourglass’ effect, through—generating a great deal of 1.5 metres, while the trunk of the in which the trunk has a zone of heat from friction. It is necessary to Dwarf has a diameter of about restricted diameter part way up. use a blade with heat-resistant teeth 200 mm from ground level up. made of stellite or tungsten carbide After 30–40 years, however, both Preserving and milling the material. Even so, water must be the Tall and the Dwarf show some coconut log squirted onto the blade to keep the tapering of trunk diameter. In very temperature down. Because of the old palms (more than 80 years), and Coconut wood is milled where gradient of declining density from in palms stressed by disease, nutrient palms are plentiful and the price the outside to the centre (the radial deficiency or drought, the taper may is right. Indigenous people are gradient), trunk sectors of only be more severe. is ‘pencil pointing’ reluctant to sacrifice old palms, relatively small cross-section can be is usually a prelude to death caused even though production of fruit is milled if uniform density is required. by decline or the wind-induced very low, but as the usefulness and snapping of the frail upper trunk. value of the timber have increased, the prices paid by the millers have Coconut timber from the outer become more attractive. tube of the trunk is visually very attractive, with a distinctive pattern It is wise to remove the fronds of 1-mm dark reddish spots (formed before felling a palm, to achieve by the bundles of cells that conduct more control and minimise the risk water) revealed in a cross cut, or of collateral damage to plants or 1-mm wide stripes in a lengthways structures nearby. cut, against a light cream-to-brown If a palm trunk cannot be milled background. ere are no growth immediately, it should be ‘preserved’ rings because, as with all palms, the against fungus and beetle attack diameter is fixed by the size of the by immersion in an appropriate trunk ‘template’ located beneath the chemical bath, thereby avoiding growing point. Because there is no very rapid deterioration in outdoor bark on the trunk, there is no repair storage. e trunk treated this way mechanism to deal with damage can be used unmilled as a post or from cutting, gouge marks from pole in buildings and fences. boot spikes, the impact of bullets or any other hazard. A period of e coconut log is composed of growth-checking stress, followed by thick, hard fibres separated by a Figure 8-5. A palm in Hawaii showing stress alleviation and normal growth, softer matrix, which comes adrift a severe restriction in the trunk due from the sides as the saw cuts to a prolonged period of stress.

98 Precision cutting recovers e very attractive colour and of middle-aged palms (see Figure the best wood pattern of well-finished coconut 5-2 in Chapter 5). Other crops, wood from the outer zone makes such as coffee, kava and vanilla, also Figure 8-6 shows how a log might it an ideal raw material for many do well in this situation. Shading be cut to recover a high proportion forms of decorative furnishings may limit their yield, but the shade of the dense outer tube, which can (tables, chairs, bookcases, desks), reduces evaporative demand, thereby be used for load-bearing structures, or for veneer to cover the outer moderating water stress, and the flooring, tool handles and furniture surface of a briefcase or display palms also reduce the risk of wind and has the highest market value. cabinet (this use is a feature of damage to the intercrop. Weed Material from the inner tube can coconut woodwork in Tanzania). competition is usually moderate in be used for limited-load bearers, e timber is also popular as raw such a mixed-crop arrangement, furniture, wall panelling and curios. material for small carvings of many because of the high aggregate e lowest-density inner wood is kinds. As the greater part of the shading effect. suitable only for wall panelling. Tall’s trunk has a diameter in the range of 300–400 mm, there is no scope for thicker planks to be recovered, but larger items, especially for structural use, could be made by gluing together smaller slabs to form a compound unit.

Coconut shade benefits other crops A significant by-product of a mature grove of palms is the open and only moderately shady environment beneath the elevated Figure 8-6. A guide to the milling of canopy. ere is plenty of space for the coconut log allowing separation of other tree or annual crops, but the structural timber of differing density annuals usually do better under and strength, relating to location full sunlight. Cacao (chocolate), in within the trunk structure. e radius particular, benefits from diffuse light Figure 8-7. Using a chain saw on of the log reduces from 200 mm in of around 50–60% full intensity, Manus Island, Papua New Guinea the lower trunk of a Tall palm to 150 such as that transmitted by a stand to mill a coconut log for structural mm at a height of 4 to 8 m. beams. (Dan Etherington)

99 An image with global of Australia, to name but a few), of first contact between European appeal none of these has the evocative cultures and the ‘East’, and it has cultural and lifestyle associations remained popular because it sustains Palms of many kinds are valued for of the coconut. Few tourist resorts the notion that one can escape the their ornamental beauty, but the in tropical climes lack coconut stressful pressure of the world by coconut has achieved a special status palms in their landscaped or natural having a ‘personal’ desert island. as the symbol of the warm, languid environments. and relaxing seaside or island Nowadays, the threat of sea-level holiday environment. Europeans One other image of the coconut rise as a consequence of global also associate the coconut with palm has been widely used: the warming has rather altered the exotic and tempting places, inhabited solitary palm on a ‘desert island’. perception of tiny islands where by attractive indigenous peoples is symbolises the ability of the palms grow. e atolls and coral untroubled by the frenetic lifestyle marooned sailor or traveller to islands of the world rarely rise more of industrial cities. Whereas there survive on any island, no matter than two metres above the current are many other attractive palms (the how small, as long as there is a high-tide level. A sea-level of rise of Cuban Royal of the Caribbean, the food supply from a coconut palm. palmyra or sugar palm of Asia, and is image is popular in industrial the Livistona and bangalow palms society, having evolved from the era

Figure 8-9. A ‘desert island’, Figure 8-8. Contrast between the equally visually attractive crowns of coconut comprising two palms on a land and Livistona palms on the east coast of Australia. Unlike coconut petioles fragment in fresh water, at Rennell (frond stems) those of the Livistona palm are thorny, reducing its appeal. Island, Solomon Islands.

100 even one metre would be enough to ‘sink’ such islands, rendering them uninhabitable and delivering the outcome depicted in the Minties wrapper scene reproduced in Figure 8-10.

Figure 8-10. Sea level rise could produce the same result as shown here (taken from a Minties wrapper) on tropical strands, atolls and coral islands that are the natural home to the coconut palm. (Jeremy for DESIGN lab)

Figure 8-11. Examples of furniture manufactured from coconut wood by the Pacific Green Company.

101 chapter 9 Selecting a sound coconut at the market, and processing it at home

e immature fruit (the ‘tender’ or drinking nut), prized as a source of pure and refreshing drink, is opened while you wait by skilled vendors in tropical markets. e amateur, trying to do this at home, must use a suitable machete in a safe manner. Practise makes perfect. e mature fresh fruit must be dehusked to allow access to the bare nut, or split with an axe to get directly to the kernel. Suitable tools allow dehusking by the unaided beginner. After the water is recovered, there are various ways to remove and process the kernel.

102 Preparing a ‘tender nut’: a with the husk already sliced from the one fifth of a turn and pushed onto specialised task lower end and cuts a hole through the the spike with a movement that shell to take a drinking straw. drags the husk outwards between e urban dweller does not usually the first and second incisions. at find a coconut for drinking, called If you are a novice, trim the tender strip of husk can then be pulled by a ‘tender’ or ‘drinking’ nut, on sale nut carefully at the lower end, hand towards the bottom of the in the local markets. But coconut where the husk is thinnest. Be fruit, exposing a narrow section of juice (known also as coconut water, careful with the trimming knife; the nut within. A series of similar and by many visitors erroneously as the risk of injury will diminish with moves completes the removal of the ‘coconut milk’; see Chapter 7) is a accumulated experience. Another husk in three or four more pieces. featured drink at informal markets approach is to dehusk the fruit and roadside stalls close by the farms and then pierce the ‘soft eye’ to gain where the fruits are produced. e access to the water with a straw. e roadside drink seller presents the fruit immature fruit is more difficult to dehusk than the mature fruit. And beware the moist husk, because it stains all that it touches!

Dehusking: a choice of tools

ere are two basic ways of dehusking a coconut fruit by hand: first, using a spike fixed firmly and more or less vertically so that its tip is about 600 mm high (higher for a tall person); second, using a ‘coconut knife’.

e spike technique is used wherever the coconut is grown. e operator holds the fruit horizontal Figure 9-1. A metal dehusking pipe and pushes its upper or ‘stalk’ end Figure 9-2. e spike of a common supported by a triangular base. e firmly down onto the spike, opening digging pick being employed for pipe may be unscrewed from the the first incision in the side of the dehusking — convenient, but not an base for easy portability. husk. e fruit is then rotated about ideal height for comfortable use.

103 ere are many good dehusking e coconut knife (Figure 7-5 in the fruit. Repeat this procedure, spike designs, including a wooden Chapter 7) serves as a dehusking levering with the knife and pulling or metal shaft with the upper end tool, as its flat, sharpened end is the husk off bit by bit, until the nut formed into a ‘blade’ and with the easily inserted into the husk. With is fully dehusked. base driven into the ground or the fruit resting on the ground, attached to a portable base (Figure insert the knife deep into the husk Buying a fresh mature nut 9-1). It is also possible to use the near the upper end of the fruit e coconut user who has access point of a trenching tool, known and then push the knife, edge first, only to dehusked nuts at the market in Australia as a ‘pick’, and there towards the top of the fruit, creating needs to be alert to indicators of are many ingenious mechanised a sliced incision. Rotate the fruit freshness. Choosing a nut requires dehusking devices that use hooks in about one sixth of a turn and make care and the use of indirect various ways to grab chunks of husk, a second incision before pushing indicators of quality, because or that have a split spike with one the handle sideways to lever up the the edible portion is completely hinged half that is forced away from tuft of husk between the incisions, concealed within the shell. the other half with a pedal-operated separating it from the shell (move 2 lever, dragging a piece of husk with it. in Figure 9-3). Grasp the tuft and e first thing to do is to feel the use a strong pull while holding the weight of the nut: if it seems light fruit firmly to separate the tuft from compared to others, there will be

Figure 9-3. A sequence of moves in dehusking the fruit with a ‘coconut knife’. e first incision (left) is followed by another and then a tuft of fibre is levered out (centre) so that it can be grasped and pulled right off (right).

104 little water left inside. Select only a angles. Quite often, the soft eye is Nuts from the Caribbean are nut that makes a splashing sound notably larger than the other two and marketed in the United States, when you shake it, indicating that the shell encircling it is not raised, Canada and Europe in a plastic plenty of water remains. making recognition very simple. shrink-wrap package with an opening surrounding the eyes. is Next, examine the soft eye, making Look carefully for any discolouration is intended to extend the shelf life sure that you have distinguished it on the soft eye; it is normally covered by slowing down evaporation of the from the two ‘blind’ eyes. e shell by a dry, brown disc. If the embryo is nut water. Such wrapping might also is usually slightly raised around one exposed or protruding through the reduce the access of decomposing side of each blind eye. Also, there eye, reject the nut because infection organisms to the kernel via minute are three faint ‘stripes’ on the shell and spoilage of the kernel is likely. channels through the shell (the extending around from the bottom Bacterial and fungal ‘spoilers’, which channels were once connected to the top (the end where the eyes enter through the soft eye, spread to fibres and through them to are), and meeting at a point between very quickly inside the nut. e nut the palm). Arguably, a nut with a the three eyes. e angle between water and the inner surface of the 10–20-mm coat of intact fibre is less the two stripes closest to the soft eye kernel are a very favourable place for prone to bacterial invasion than a is much wider than the other two invading microbes. nut that has been scraped clean. In Look at the whole nut for signs of the future, a processor may devise patchy staining due to leakage of a way to seal the shell and soft eye moisture from a crack in the shell. so well that the nut has a greatly ‘Old’ nuts have a greyish look on prolonged shelf-life, becoming the fragments of husk that remain equivalent to a sealed, canned on the surface, instead of a fresh product. brown look. Fresh mature nuts have Cool storage suppresses the activity a shelf-life of perhaps two months at of microorganisms, keeping the nut moderate or low temperature (below fresh for longer, and freezing has 20°C). e delay between collection been shown to work on a small scale. from a farm and presentation in e value of the nut is probably not an urban market can sometimes be high enough, however, to justify longer than this, and a proportion freezing by the marketer. Defrosted of nuts is generally unsuitable for kernel is softer and more easily consumption. e vendor faces the chewed, having lost some of the Figure 9-4. A spiral of kernel same problems as the buyer and may firm crispness of the fresh kernel, extracted using the coconut knife have difficulty screening out bad without loss of any flavour. is which is shown in Figure 9-3. nuts. So buyer beware!

105 makes shredding in a blender or to recover the water for drinking. It the other), and then smashing it juicer easier, and allows you to make there is a bad aroma in the water, against a hard surface. e kernel coconut milk in your own kitchen. reject it. In such a case, the kernel is fairly easily prised away from is likely to be off-flavour too, but small pieces of broken shell. With Recovering the water not always—if there is no trace of a suitable tool, however, such as a discolouration, the kernel may still heavy-bladed coconut knife (Figure ere are many ways to deal with be ‘sweet’ and edible. 7-5 in Chapter 7), a 300-mm length the fresh mature coconut. e task of 12-mm iron rod, or a small axe is usually a novel one for the buyer, Many users open the nut after or cleaver, you can split a nut into and usually involves piercing and draining by throwing it down two neat hemispheres with a very reaming out a small plug of kernel hard on concrete, or by placing it firm, sharp blow or two on the nut’s from behind the soft eye in order in two shopping bag (one inside ‘equator’.

If you fear injury to the hand that holds the nut, play safe by using a guide stick to control the splitting implement. Rest the nut on a firm surface, supported with a loose towel so that it does not roll. Hold a ruler or stick vertically and firmly against the equator of the nut, and then slide the tool down, striking hard parallel to the equator, to open a crack in the nut. Once a distinct crack appears, you can insert a knife to prise the two halves apart. Some nuts have quite thick shells, requiring blows of increased force with the cracking tool; others have thin shells that crack wide open at the first try.

Water drains out as the nut halves are separated. It is easily collected Figure 9-5. Mature nuts partially dehusked, with a coating of intact fibres. in an open dish, and this method Leaving some fibres attached extends the shelf life of the nut but may not be is simpler than draining it out acceptable to plant quarantine inspectors where nuts are imported. beforehand through the soft eye.

106 Recovering the kernel An innovative way of removing thick). A thin, flexible blade with the soft or medium-firm kernel of a rounded end is inserted between e kernel can be extracted in narrow immature nuts has been developed the shell and the kernel, and pushed strips from the half-nut in two ways. in India to produce a culinary around to separate the kernel from One way is to carefully push the sharp product known as the ‘snowball’ the shell on each half of the nut. e end of a coconut knife into the edge of (see Figure 10-8 in Chapter 10). white sphere that emerges can be the kernel and then make a parallel cut e dehusked nut is held against presented as dessert, with a straw 10–15 mm from the edge while the a shielded circular-saw blade and inserted for drinking the water, blade slides along the inner surface of rotated to achieve a cut right around after which it can be divided up and the shell, prising the kernel sideways the equator that is at most 8 mm consumed. and separating it from the shell. Push deep (the shell is usually 4–6 mm the knife all the way around the edge of the hemisphere, removing the kernel in strips, or perhaps forming a spiral if the kernel holds together (Figure 9-6). Alternatively, use a strong, thin-bladed knife to cut along a similar line to that made with the coconut knife, but without displacing the kernel sideways. After making a cut halfway around the half-nut, slide the knife between the strip of kernel and the shell to separate them.

e second method of kernel extraction is to shred it out of the half-nut using a tool with special teeth or scraping loops, as described below. You can also remove the kernel in a half-nut in one piece, after ‘loosening’ it with heat. After two or three minutes in a microwave oven set to ‘high’, the kernel around the edge begins to separate from the Figure 9-6. Coconut kernel being extracted from a half nut using the blade of a shell. Coax it right out of the shell screw-driver. A robust table knife with a rounded end could also be used, but a with a flexible knife blade. coconut knife performs this task more efficiently.

107 e mature nut, partially dehusked Ways to use the kernel on the kernel is then pared away, but with a layer of fibre left all the water is collected, and the white round, is used as an offering in e industrialised production of ball of kernel is washed and fed Hindu ritual. Market demand for desiccated coconut usually begins into a machine, which converts it fresh mature nuts increases in the with the removal of shell from to the type of shreds, fines or flakes lead-up to certain major festivals. In dehusked nuts by a highly skilled required. Prompt drying to below the course of the ritual, the nut is operator, who chips the shell away 5% moisture content, combined broken open and the water poured with a special curved metal knife, with very careful sanitary procedures out. Usually, the kernel is taken for leaving the kernel as an intact ball in throughout, ensures a stable and consumption after the ceremony. the hand. e brown outer coating uncontaminated final product. Some processors add sugar to desiccated coconut to increase the appeal of its flavour, and some also add a preservative, such as sulphite, as ‘insurance’ to suppress any microorganisms. Once the kernel has been removed in strips, chunks or half-nut form, people with sound teeth can chew it and enjoy the fresh coconut flavour. Kernel chunks that have been frozen and defrosted are softened and more easily chewed, but will not have lost any flavour. ese soft pieces are also more easily processed in a blender or juicer for the preparation of coconut cream (unfrozen kernel should be chopped into small pieces before processing). e product from the blender can be used as topping for dessert or squeezed by hand or through a cloth to produce coconut cream, as described in more Figure 9-7. Diced kernel that can be partially dried and browned in the detail below. microwave to produce tasty coconut ‘nibblies’.

108 Small, 10-mm cubed pieces of fresh e main reason kernel is shredded through a strainer (such as muslin kernel make attractive ‘nibblies’ after is to permit the extraction from it cloth) will separate remaining shreds being roasted in a microwave to of coconut cream or coconut milk. from the liquid. enhance the flavour (Figure 9-7). One extraction method involves Various types of mechanised press squeezing the raw shreds inside a are used industrially to extract cream cloth ‘filter’ to force out the thick Shredding the kernel from the kernel more effectively and coconut cream, which has a high oil for coconut cream and efficiently than hand methods. content and a strong coconut flavour. coconut milk When the cream has been collected, From the consumer’s point of view, it is useful to know the ‘strength’ of An alternative to cutting the a chosen volume of hot water is a coconut milk product. Standards mature kernel free from the shell added to help extract the remainder proposed by the Asian Pacific in chunks is to scrape it out using of the emulsion from the kernel Coconut Community for different the traditional ‘comb’ of ancient and the cloth is squeezed again, grades of kernel extract are shown in coconut cultures (a flat metal strip producing the lighter liquid known Table 9.1: 20–40 mm wide, with a dozen as coconut milk. or more short teeth formed by Some villagers simply knead the e composition of preserved coconut making shallow saw cuts across shreds and water vigorously and milk and cream is revealed on some one end), the hand-held scraper of squeeze the it in their bare hands to labels, but manufacturers are obliged the Philippines, or the rotating Sri separate out the milk (see Figure 7-3 to do so only in response to national Lankan hemispherical shredder in Chapter 7). Two such pressings legislation. It is up to the consumer to operated either by hand or motor. will yield most of the potential demand product specification for the e hand rotation device (Figure coconut milk. Passing the milk sake of consistency. 7-2) is quite rapid, as the entire kernel contents of a half-nut can be extracted as shreds in a minute Table 9.1. Standards for kernel extracts or so. It takes a little practice Minimum Maximum to avoid including some of the coconut fat (%) water (%) Gap (%)a brown scrapings from the inside of the shell in the extract. In many Coconut cream 19.0 75.0 6.0 local markets in Sri Lanka and Coconut milk 11.5 85.0 3.5 elsewhere, the buyer can now Coconut light milk 6.0 92.5 1.5 choose a nut from the pile and a hand it to the vendor, who shreds e ‘gap’ may be filled with coconut fat or other ingredients, such as natural sugar and protein. it expertly with a motorised device Source: Asia Pacific Coconut Community Draft Standard APCC STAN 3:1995D for little extra charge.

109 Coconut milk: culinary Extracting oil from Separating coconut oil uses shredded kernel from coconut milk Coconut milk should be used Partially dried, shredded coconut A technique widely used in the soon after extraction, as it has kernel is a useful feedstock for the Philippines to produce high- a refrigerated shelf-life of only separation of high-quality coconut quality virgin coconut oil relies 3–4 days. It is rich in oil, sugars and oil. Fresh kernel has a moisture on natural separation of the oil proteins, and is a very hospitable content around 50%, which should from the standing milk at ambient medium for microorganisms. be reduced to around 12% for oil temperature. e technique is extraction. Shreds release oil far explained in Chapter 10. Coconut milk has formed part of the more readily at this moisture content traditional diet of many indigenous In Melanesia, where firewood is than when dried for storage, usually tropical peoples for millennia, and plentiful, the milk or cream is heated to around 6%. Desiccated coconut is credited by nutritionists with directly until all the water has is usually packaged at 5% moisture contributing to those peoples’ evaporated. is product loses some content, and would require careful outstandingly high level of dental of the aroma retained in oil that has remoistening to enable efficient oil and physical health (see Chapter not been subjected to prolonged extraction. 11). When such people move from heating. traditional foods to a diet high in e Direct Micro-Expelling (DME) carbohydrate and ‘long-chain’ fats, oil extraction kit produced by their health deteriorates alarmingly. Kokonut Pacific Ltd allows ‘virgin’ Many people in industrial societies coconut oil to be extracted with 90% now seek minimise their intake of efficiency (see Chapter 10). Virgin coconut oil for health reasons, but coconut oil has outstanding qualities most are confused about its use of aroma and flavour, and is much in because of the negative massages demand for cooking, cosmetic and delivered by marketers of competing pharmaceutical uses. food oils. It would require a large consumption of coconut cream in one’s prepared food to achieve the common target of a daily intake of 50 mL of oil. Enthusiastic users are inclined to consume coconut oil ‘raw’.

110 chapter 10 e coconut’s industrial history, and future

e coconut has had a 150-year ‘industrial’ history affected by war and depression. Productive capacity is still limited by this legacy. Familiar coconut food products have an assured future, and some have untapped market potential. Coconut oil is ideal for cooking, but is also used in superior soaps and detergents. Its proven performance as diesel motor fuel has added to its value, especially in remote locations.

111 Industrial demand builds kernel. For many decades, oil depression, beginning in 1929, the early copra trade extraction from copra was done only saw profits from copra production in the importing countries, chiefly fall and foreign investment in new e coconut production from the United States and the European plantations cease. many of the most favoured tropical countries. environments has recently come Plantation development remained War brings competitors almost to the end of a 150-year buoyant during World War I Military occupation during the period of ‘capture’ by industrial (1914–18) and reached a peak just war in the Pacific (1941–45) economies. at era began early in before 1920, when it encompassed interrupted exports from several the 19th century, with investment the colonies of the South Pacific large coconut-producing regions, in ever more production capacity to (Papua and New Guinea, Solomon which led to a severe shortage of meet demand for soap and lighting, Islands, Vanuatu, Fiji, Samoa). ere vegetable oil in industrial nations. and for substitutes for scarce animal was even a flurry of small-scale e shortage was particularly acute fats in cooking. In the United planting in Australia to supply oil for in United States, which responded States, coconut oil was especially glycerine to support the manufacture with a huge research effort to prominent, partly because of that of explosives. e global economic boost the local vegetable oil supply country’s decades-long colonial tie to the Philippines, which ended only with the 1941 Japanese invasion. Demand for soap in Europe in the early 19th century translated into imports of coconut oil from the Far East, when sources of home-grown and imported animal fats (including tallow from remote colonies like Australia, and whale oil), failed to meet demand. By the end of the century, European investment capital was being directed into coconut plantations in Sri Lanka, the Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia), Malaya, Fiji, the Philippines, some Figure 10-1. Some examples of merchandised coconut products: (L–R) soap, Caribbean colonies and elsewhere cooking oil, two brands of milk, and juice. ere are many brands of milk to produce copra—the storable, and cream, and the buyer should check the label for a listing of ingredients, transportable form of coconut including the percentage of fat (see Chapter 9 for details).

112 using annual oil crops. Until then, By the end of World War II in 1945, and other saturated animal fats) home-grown American vegetable soybean oil had the potential to was not. In spite of a substantial oils (by-products from cottonseed, capture much of the market share postwar recovery in the supply of soybean and maize) had mostly previously held by coconut oil. In coconut oil, the market share and been used in paint formulations the next two or three decades, that is price gradually declined to a level for structural timber, but now they precisely what happened. too low to revitalise plantation-scale were promoted vigorously in the production. food market. Soybeans, in particular, An unrestrained marketing were selected and bred to become campaign succeeded in persuading Failure to stop a downhill highly productive under the farming most consumers that soybean oil slide of market demand conditions prevailing in millions of and its derivatives were healthy, and hectares of the American mid-west. that coconut oil (along with dairy During the decades since 1960, the export price of copra fluctuated wildly in response to short-term variations in supply, but always showed a strong downward trend (Figure 10-2).

Oil palm, which yields both palm oil and palm-kernel oil, expanded rapidly as a crop during the 1960s despite similar price fluctuations, and succeeded in countering the downward price trend with yield improvement through breeding and management. Fortunately for palm- oil producers, their plantations were mostly established in regions free Figure 10-2. Price trend of coconut oil and three other vegetable oils between from the destructive hazards of 1960 and 2001. In 2002 the price is so poor that many smallholders no longer cyclones, hurricanes and typhoons, find it worth while to produce copra. Coconut oil showed a sharp decline which frequently disrupt coconut in price during the 1970s. e attack of the marketers of unsaturated oils on production. e coconut palm saturated fat, beginning in the 1960s, eventually depressed the entire market usually survives such weather, but for vegetable oils as consumers mistakenly came to believe that dietary oil was its production is depressed for a dangerous. year or more after the event.

113 It was thought that coconut would might suit that scale of operation are Figure 10-2 also records a decline be able to recover its profitability probably more profitably invested in the prices of all vegetable oils. It with similar yield increases, but it in other crops, especially oil palm. is mainly the huge decline in food is now recognised that coconut has Fortunately, the demand for the uses of coconut oil in industrialised a substantially lower potential yield coconut’s lauric oil for industrial countries, however, that has eroded of oil than oil palm, mainly because use in developed economies has coconut oil’s once leading price in of the coconut’s high proportion of underpinned demand for coconut oil the oilseed market. non-fatty fruit components. Coconut in that sector, preventing a collapse. is is attributed to wide adoption also exhibits strong, age-related Sodium laurel sulphate (SLS, a of low-fat diets in the United States, changes in its capacity to intercept derivative of lauric acid) and other as a result of the denigration of light, the ultimate determinant of coco-chemicals are used in many saturated fats by the promoters yield. ere have been impressive detergent products. SLS is a staple of unsaturated fats, followed by yield increases achieved with product in the detergent industry the realisation that hydrogenated hybrid coconuts in high-resource because the major alternative, alkyl unsaturated fats present a whole environments, because of their earlier benzene, has been banned for use new set of health problems. Coupled fruiting and because of beneficial in household detergents in most with these changes is a widespread changes in the partitioning of energy countries. Alkyl benzene has very ‘gut logic’ suggesting that fat in the between oil and various organs (shell, poor biodegradability, whereas diet translates to fat accumulation in husk and trunk). SLS is an excellent cleanser and is the body. In Chapter 11, I explain in biodegradable as well. e very diversity of the coconut detail why this is a misguided view. Coconut faces uncertainty even in palm’s usable components, however is combination of confusion and the lauric oil market, however, as much it decreases the output of contradictions in the food industry genetically modified ‘lauric canola’ oil, perhaps ensures that the palm about healthy and unhealthy fat, is now widely grown in North will retain a buoyant place in the and an aversion to fat in favour of America. Ironically, the appearance economy of traditional coconut high-carbohydrate diets, has left the of this competing oil, along with regions, which relies on the average consumer baffled—and the a huge increase in the supply of enterprise of smallholders. market for fats and oils very flat. palm-kernel oil (which has a 30% Demand for lauric oils lauric oil content), has somewhat Besides market warfare, the coconut underpins market stabilised the supply and steadied has faced further difficulties because the sluggish market (Figure 10-2). supply to its principal markets is e prospect of reviving a When coconut oil was the principal prone to disruption by to extremes plantation-based economy for lauric oil, prices fluctuated widely in of weather. Drought affects coconut oil seems now to have response to variations in supply. production in many places, and faded completely, as resources that typhoons do so in the Philippines,

114 which is the largest exporter. some farmers to begin replanting, e processor expressed the oil India and Indonesia may be larger ideally in a phased operation taking after grinding and heating the producers, but they do not export as perhaps one quarter of the farm at copra, and then applied three much. Indian producers, particularly, a time, and generating some extra treatments—refining, bleaching cater to massive home market. income by selling the trunks of the and deodorising—to bring the oil old palms for milling. In some areas, to an acceptable standard of clarity, e legacy of copra coconut trunks are now highly prized colour and aroma. is oil was production for their timber value, which would then marketed as deep-frying oil, as ease the financial risk of replanting. shortening for general domestic use, A strong industrial ‘hangover’ still and for soap and detergent making. affects the production of many e traditional coconut plantation coconut farmers, especially in large was dedicated to the production producers like the Philippines and of copra, which is simply the dried Indonesia, where copra was once the kernel, for transport to a processor lynchpin. Old processing technology in an industrialised country. In many and infrastructure are still in use. cases, copra was produced by cutting Smallholder clients are more or less the kernel from split whole fruit in ‘locked in’ by the dominant industry the field and transporting it ‘green’ of their districts, either copra making to a drier fuelled by firewood, husks or sale of fresh nuts for desiccated and shells, or mineral oil. coconut, and are nearly powerless to Alternatively, the whole nuts were generate alternative products. ey transported to a central area and have delayed replanting because of dehusked there. e split nuts were their need to hold on to the meagre dried and the shell separated later. income that old palms can generate, Both husk and shell made up the compared to the alternative of lower fuel supply. income during the regeneration phase. Once dry, the copra was stored in sacks ere is also an expectation that and exported from the nearest port. higher-yielding coconut palms might is meant that many months passed be made available some time soon. between production and further Figure 10-3. Extensive coconut Farmers need reminding that young processing. Some quality control was plantation — a rare sight at the palms will probably yield five times imposed to ensure that the copra did beginning of the 21st century. (Roland more than palms of the same variety, not become seriously infested with Bourdeix, Centre for International in the same district, greater than destructive insects or microorganisms Cooperation in Agricultural Research 50 years of age. is might spur during its long journey. for Development (CIRAD), France)

115 Naturally, the highest price was paid of Indonesia, the Philippines and and is available for local food use, for the food uses of oil—the market India remain locked into particular these processes hold out the prospect that has been all but destroyed by processors, who still specialise in supplying an economical diesel fuel the marketing push of the producers extracting oil from copra. replacement in isolated areas. of polyunsaturated oil from soybean, ere is hope that small-scale e DME oil extraction kit cotton and maize, and more recently local production of coconut oil produced by Kokonut Pacific Ltd from sunflower and canola. will experience a resurgence in consists of a perforated cylindrical the near future, as appropriate metal tube and a compressing Small-scale and medium- technology in the form of the DME plunger connected to a hand- scale processing for high- (Direct Micro-expelling) method operated lever. is kit allows up to quality products (invented in Australia by Dr Dan 90% of the oil to be extracted from Very few large-scale copra Etherington), or the fermentation well-prepared coconut shreds. method employed in the Philippines plantations remain, because the price Medium-scale mechanical processing (see below), become more widely has generally become uneconomical of 3600 coconuts per hour has used. Besides making good quality for that mode of production. been achieved by another Australia- oil that qualifies for the ‘virgin cold- However, many smallholders in based inventor, Coconut Processing pressed coconut oil’ (VCNO) label the really large coconut economies Company Pty Ltd. Whole fruit are fed into a machine, which slices them in half lengthways and uses a water jet to extract the kernel in one piece from each half. e extracted kernel is shredded, dried quickly and pressed. e oil produced is of the highest quality, outstandingly fresh, and suitable for food or any other use. e husk and shell are passed though a beater and separator, producing clean shell, pith and coir. A traditional Philippines’ process, based on fermentation over a period of one or two days, also produces high-quality oil from extracted Figure 10-4. Large-scale processing area for coconut fruits in Mozambique, with coconut milk. Practised at the dryers close by. cottage level, this method relies

116 on the separation of oil from its any residual moisture. With High-quality coconut oil would also emulsion in the milk as the sugar rigorous attention to cleanliness and prove to be a profitable cash earner and other ingredients in the milk temperature control, this oil also when supplied to soap and cosmetic are consumed by the fermentation qualifies for the VCNO label, to manufacturers in smaller nations as process. e oil floats to the surface which in most cases an ‘organic’ label an import replacement. to be skimmed off and then heated to can also be added, as chemical use in A regional marketing approach for a moderate temperature to evaporate coconut groves is rare indeed. these products, and especially for food derivatives of coconut oil, seems essential to meet the challenge from palm oil. Coming from very highly capitalised enterprises, palm oil has made great inroads into the urban food-oil markets in India, Malaysia, ailand and China, depressing the local price of coconut oil. e unique health and chemical stability advantages of coconut oil, based on its predominantly short-chain fatty acid mix (see Chapter 11), need to be promoted very strongly to recapture market share.

Some food uses require economies of scale Access to lucrative markets for Figure 10-5. Schematic of the press desiccated coconut (as an example) used in the DME (Direct Micro- in industrial economies is in the Expelling) system of coconut hands of large companies whose processing. e lever drives a plunger local monopoly of processing enables which compresses shredded kernel Figure 10-6. e coconut press being them to pay a low price for the previously dried to a critical moisture operated in a Fijian village where supply of fresh nuts. One advantage content. Up to 90% of the oil can steady production of high quality of such large-scale production units be extracted with this device. (Dan virgin coconut oil in now taking is that quality control is more readily Etherington) place. (Dan Etherington) monitored.

117 Similarly, production of coconut can be started on diesel fuel and labour-intensive but traditional milk for export is highly capitalised, switched over to coconut oil once pursuit in some parts of Indonesia, requiring skilled management and the coconut oil has been warmed where the sap is collected twice daily, technical expertise to succeed. Here sufficiently by heat transfer. and then evaporated to yield palm too, fresh nuts are purchased from sugar, prized locally over cane sugar. the farmers at the lowest possible Nut water or coconut Some coconut hybrids produce as price and de-shelled as for desiccated juice much sugar (in tonnes per hectare coconut. e kernel is shredded and per year) as sugarcane, but the relative the cream is pressed out and mixed Coconut juice has also become economics of these two sources of with water to achieve the desired an important commodity, and is sugar, in a range of environments, fat content. After a brief heating to exported in bottles and cans from has not yet been studied. Cane sugar pasteurise it, the product is placed into Hainan Island and Vietnam to production costs can be greatly a can or tetrapak for export (industry mainland China (see Figure 10-1). reduced by mechanisation, whereas standards for coconut cream, milk and No quality standards have yet been toddy tapping of the coconut will lite milk are given in Chapter 9). set for the level of any particular components of coconut juice. Juice always be labour intensive. ere from markedly immature fruit is appears to be great potential for Coconut oil as engine fuel quite high in natural sugar (5% or high-value nonalcoholic derivatives so), but this diminishes as the fruit of coconut toddy as a health drink, In places where the market for approaches maturity. Extra sugar especially for children. food oil is limited, and particularly is added to many lines of canned on isolated islands, operators of coconut juice, but the amount is Processing fibre and shell diesel engines have begun to use not specified on the label. One large requires specialised skills coconut oil as a fuel replacement. plantation in Indonesia exports Within the tropics, where the mean almost its entire production of Coconut fibre (100 000 tonnes temperature is generally above 25°C, coconut kernel and water as canned per year) and shell (300 000 coconut oil remains liquid and flows products to a range of markets. tonnes per year) are still traded readily through the injectors of a widely on the global market, and diesel engine. Mixing coconut oil Possibilities for derivatives are especially valuable to India 2:1 with conventional diesel fuel of coconut sap (toddy) and Sri Lanka, where there is a insures against it solidifying if the strong tradition of processing them temperature falls below 25°C and Palm sugar from coconut sap, or and a substantial export trade. In reduces the risk of ‘crusting’ of the toddy, might become an important countries that lack this tradition, valves with incombustible residue product where young, highly there is little inclination to begin after many hours of running time. productive palms are established. processing fibre, partly due to the In cooler environments, the engine Tapping palms for toddy is a very absence of the required specialised

118 skills. e introduction of simple Polishing the interior of the curved Objects of great appeal can be made hammer-milling and combing might shell is a greater challenge, requiring from coconut shell, especially when stimulate fibre processing in other a rounded carrier for the sandpaper. they are finished with a dark varnish. communities. e dependence of many producers worldwide on husks and shells for domestic fuel might militate against adding value to husk in this way. e ash from husks and shells is particularly high in potash and is used to fertilise potassium- hungry palms. Potash is also readily leached into the soil from mulched husk kept in the field. is is an important matter, because potassium deficiency frequently limits the productivity of the coconut on many different soil types. Coconut shell continues to be in demand as a source of charcoal and particularly of activated carbon for chemical processes like the separation of gold from crushed ore, with the Philippines and Sri Lanka being major exporters. Coconut shell powder is used as the combustible carrier in mosquito repellant coils. Great potential remains for coconut shell in artefacts produced on a cottage scale for the tourist market. e shell can be polished very easily using a succession of sandpapers (such as grades 60, 120 and 240) to provide an increasingly fine finish. Figure 10-7. A very large, polished coconut shell used to support a flower display.

119 Niche marketing of high- raw and shredded kernel, coconut In India, there has been a concerted value products chutney and coconut jam, oil (both effort to develop novel products, virgin and copra-derived), coconut and recently two very promising In local markets of the coconut milk and coconut water, and, in items have emerged. One consists of heartland, a wide range of coconut certain cultures, both fresh and sweet, dried flakes of coconut kernel, food products is readily available. fermented toddy. produced by immersing thin flakes ese include fresh coconuts, of fresh kernel in a concentrated sugar solution long enough to remove most of the water. e flakes acquire a trace of sugar coating while retaining their distinctive coconut flavour, making them very attractive indeed. e second new product is known as the ‘snowball’. It is a complete ball of immature kernel extracted from the nut while retaining the water inside (the technique is described in Chapter 9). e pure white sphere is placed in a goblet and a straw is inserted to allow the water to be drunk. e kernel is then consumed, using a small knife or spoon. e snowball fetches the equivalent of US$5–10 at smart restaurants and resorts (see Figure 10-8).

Figure 10-8 A ‘snowball’ prepared from an immature nut and presented as dessert, comprising both soft kernel and its contents of nut-water (fresh coconut juice).

120 chapter 11 e wonder food

Since antiquity, coconut has been a staple food of many indigenous peoples. It was embraced by industrial society as a raw material for many products in the 19th century, but in the late 20th century an onslaught by competition saw its use decline. ere is both scientific and abundant anecdotal evidence coconut’s great health benefits, including increased energy, weight loss through the burning of body fat, natural antibiotic activity, cholesterol reduction and insulin stabilisation.

121 A valuable staple since many native peoples who depended Coconut’s market grows, antiquity on the coconut as a major food item. then collapses He wrote of one group: Early European navigators visiting Some of them are brown, well As I have detailed in Chapter 10, the tropical coasts of the Indian and built and robust. ey have very coconut oil played a key part in Pacific oceans noted with surprise little variety of food, only having Europe’s industrial revolution. the outstanding fitness and good a few cocoanuts and roots. eir Originally used in soapmaking, it health of the indigenous people. e nourishment is from fish and was also needed for lighting and shellfish. visitors learned that the inhabitants for cooking. Along with desiccated of these regions had been consuming Torres thus records that people whose coconut, the oil became a staple coconut for thousands of years. King diet comprised coconut, roots (probably shortening ingredient in biscuit and Manuel I of Portugal, upon learning yams) and a variety of seafoods were cake recipes. from explorer Vasco da Gama of not just surviving on their island, but the great role that coconut played in were strong and healthy. e global depression that began in the human economy in coastal west 1929 hit coconut producers hard, In the 1930s, Dr Weston A. India, wrote in 1501: drying up investment capital. World Price, an American dentist, visited War II in the Pacific (1941–45) …from these trees and their fruit the South Pacific to study the are made the following things: sugar, disrupted the trade entirely, and relationship of diet to both dental honey, oil, wine, vinegar, charcoal manufacturers sought substitutes. and cordage…and matting…and and general health. He found that A desperate, and impressively it serves them for everything they people consuming traditional foods, successful, agronomic and food need. And the aforesaid fruit, in which commonly meant a diet of processing research effort, especially addition to what is thus made of it, at least 60% coconut, had excellent is their chief food, particularly at sea. in the United States, led to the teeth with no dental caries, and were ascendancy of soybean oil. In 1606, the Spanish navigator Torres generally free from serious illness. explored the southern coastline of On the other hand, among islanders When the supply of coconut oil was mainland New Guinea, encountering who had moved to trade centres— restored after the war, the product adopting an urban diet high in faced a wholly new marketplace and processed carbohydrates and low in could no longer sustain a competitive coconut—there was 26% incidence niche, despite its relatively low price. of dental caries and ‘progressive In order to protect a higher price development of degenerative disease’. for home-grown vegetable oil, a marketing strategy was designed that was intended to reduce the appeal of coconut oil, as well as of saturated animal fats.

122 Saturated and undesirable. Protection against such unsaturated fats that contained the unsaturated fats external influence by an antioxidant essential fatty acids. e unqualified is needed to stabilise the unsaturated condemnation of saturated fats Marketers of unsaturated oils were oil molecule. continued from the 1970s onwards. able to place their products in opposition to saturated oils. It is Competitors play dirty Saturated fats from vegetable worthwhile to understand a little of sources (such as coconut oil) the chemistry of food oils. Following reports that experimental and those from animal products rats fed coconut oil as their sole (such as beef, mutton, pork and Table 11-1 presents information fat showed increased cholesterol dairy milk) were both targeted. about oils of different ‘chain length’. in blood serum, a hypothesis e combined marketing and is term refers to the number that saturated fat raised harmful political muscle of the unsaturated of carbon atoms that are strung cholesterol was promulgated and fat processors was so great that together chemically to form the oil ‘marketed’ to the food industry. Both they persuaded health and food molecule. Medium-chain oils have coconut oil and saturated animal fats, regulators to accept the ‘saturated 8–12 carbon atoms and long-chain such as dairy fats, were maligned fat hypothesis’. e United States oils have 14–22 carbon atoms. as unhealthy in an unrelenting Food and Drug Administration, the In a saturated oil molecule, all the campaign that included re-education American Heart Association, and linking ability of every carbon atom of professionals throughout the the population at large, influenced is accounted for by stable, single- entire health industry. by food journalists and medical bond connections to neighbouring practitioners, accepted as truth It only later became clear that any carbon atoms in the chain and to the claim that the saturated fats in diet lacking in certain essential other chemical entities, mostly coconut oil were harmful to health. fatty acids (such as omega-3 alpha hydrogen atoms. linolenic acid) will cause a rise in e reputation of coconut oil was An unsaturated oil has one cholesterol as the health of the destroyed, notwithstanding that (monounsaturated) or more experimental animal deteriorates. hundreds of generations of coastal (polyunsaturated) double links Such fatty acids are not found in dwellers in South-East Asia and between its carbon atoms. Rather coconut oil or dairy fat (see Table the Pacific had thrived on a diet of than strengthening the linkage, 11-1) and are generally scarce coconut, fish and small amounts of this double bond is unstable, with in other saturated fats, but are carbohydrates. Indeed, in the United one of the links readily combining normally found in other parts of States in the early 20th century, with some external chemical entity. a balanced diet. is proof of the when fatty meat was common in the Such combination can cause the lack of scientific soundness of the diet, heart disease was, according to breakup of the fat molecule and the early dietary study on coconut oil Mary G. Enig in her book, Know release of a ‘free fatty acid’, which is was ignored by the marketers of the your fats, practically unknown.

123 Table 11-1. Proportion of edible fatty acids in the oil of different natural products (%). Carbon atoms/molecule and number of

Source of oil Caprylic 8 Capric 10 Lauric 12 Myristic 14 Palmitic 16 Coconut 8 7 49 18 8 Palm kernel 4 4 50 16 8 Palm 1 45 Cocoa 24 Soy 11 Olive 14 Canola (regular) 4 Canola (laurate) 37 4 3 Sunflower (regular) 7 Sunflower (high oleic) 4 Corn 12 Peanut 12 Cotton 1 26 Safflower (high linoleic) 6 Safflower (high oleic) 5 Sesame 10 Almond 7 Avocado 17 Black currant 7 Flax-seed 6 Grapeseed 7 Butter 1 2 3 12 26 Poultry 1 23 Lard 1 25 Tallow 3 25 Cod liver 4 14 a includes 17% gamma linolenic; b includes 4% butyric; c includes 7% each of EPA (eicosapentaenoic) and DHA (docosahexaenoic)

124 double bonds are shown beside the name of each fatty acid.

Stearic 18 Palmitoleic 16:1 Oleic 18:1 Linoleic 18:2 α Linolenic 18:3 Others 2 6 2 2 14 2 5 39 9 35 38 2 4 23 53 8 2 1 71 10 1 2 59 23 10 2 1 33 12 7 1 5 19 68 1 5 81 8 1 2 28 57 1 5 46 31 6 2 18 53 2 13 78 2 80 12 5 41 43 2 61 30 1 3 68 12 1 2 11 47 13 20a 3 17 14 60 4 16 72 1 12 2 28 3 1 8b 6 7 42 19 1 12 3 45 10 1 22 3 39 2 1 2 3 12 22 1 44c

125 Explanation of Table 11-1 transformed by “elongase” enzymes into fatty acids as unhealthy. ese saturated the omega-6 forms of EPA and DHA oils combine well in the diet with is table presents data from the book found within the living cell. Similarly sources of the essential fatty acids. “Know your fats – the complete primer alpha linolenic is transformed into for understanding the nutrition of fats, oils Oils that are high in unsaturated fatty omega-3 EPA and DHA. A proportion and cholesterol” by Mary Enig (Bethesda acids pose a hazard as cooking oil, of linoleic higher than three to four times Press, 2000. Silver Spring, Maryland). because transformation to trans forms the level of alpha linolenic monopolises of fatty acid occurs at high temperature. e proportion of the various fatty the transforming enzymes in the system, Multiple use of poly-unsaturated acids that are found in the oil of the resulting in reduced transformation of oil for cooking is not recommended, different crop products varies a little, the essential omega-3 fatty acid. When whereas cooking oil with predominantly but the values presented – which are the there is substantial saturated fatty acids saturated components is highly stable averages from extensive analyses, enable present however the transformation of – for example coconut and palm kernel. useful comparisons to be made. e mix alpha linolenic is protected from the Oleic (mono-unsaturated) is less of fatty acids in oils from animal sources, interference of excess linoleic. susceptible to conversion to trans fatty of which a few generic examples are For an adequate daily supply of essential acid than the polyunsaturated fatty acids. shown, are more flexible than from crop fatty acids Mary Enig recommends that sources, being usually much affected by A major transformation employed in the diet should contain 1 to 1.5% of the oil composition of the animal’s diet. the food industry for decades has been total energy as alpha linolenic acid and the partial hydrogenation of unsaturated Six saturated fatty acids are shown in the 2 to 3% of total energy as linoleic. Even fatty acids to a “saturated” form known first six columns, two mono-unsaturated then transformation to EPA and DHA as trans fatty acid. is process, applied fatty acids are next, and then the two most can be erratic. Cottage cheese and high especially to soy, canola, corn, cotton common polyunsaturated fatty acids, the sulphur yoghurt are known to improve and safflower oils, which are all high in omega-6 linoleic and the omega-3 alpha the transformation process. Alternatively linoleic acid, raises the melting point, linolenic. Coconut, palm kernel, lauric 2 to 3 grams of fish oil per day will (thereby making it solid at ordinary canola and butter stand apart through meet the need for EPA and DHA. temperature) enabling the manufacture of having many components in the short Fish species differ greatly in oil content margarine and shortening. Many serious and medium-chain fatty acid group (six with herring, mackerel and sardines at health problems including cardiovascular to fourteen carbons per molecule). e the high end with around 3 g EPA and abnormalities, stroke and carcinomas other two saturated fatty acids, palmitic DHA per 100 g of flesh, while many have been linked to the consumption and stearic are found in all oils though in tropical fish have less than 1 g per 100 of a high proportion of trans fatty acid greatly varying proportion. Likewise the g flesh. A problem for coconut, palm in the total dietary fat intake. Trans mono-unsaturated oleic acid is present kernel and butter is that they contain fatty acid is a manufactured saturated in all sources, with highest values in olive, nil or negligible essential fatty acids. form of fatty acid but its non-natural regular canola, almond, avocado, and is has led top their vilification by molecular form invokes quite different transgenic sunflower and safflower. processors of those oils which are rich in dietary consequences from the natural Poly-unsaturated linoleic is found in essential fatty acids whose promotions saturated fatty acids, which in turn are an all oils, but there is only 1% in cod liver have erroneously targetted the saturated important component for a healthy diet. oil. It is an essential fatty acid that is

126 Independent researchers in the Marketers demolish obesity. e cause of this is complex, United States attribute the success reputations, invoke and involves an imbalance in the of the campaign to demonise obesity insulin mechanism that deals with saturated fats and oils, with special carbohydrate, such that the appetite attention being paid to tropical When the relatively new palm oil gets out of control and the victim oils, to a combination of several also entered the American food craves relief through excessive food elements. Marketers of home- market, it too was marked for consumption. produced unsaturated oils engaged denigration and exclusion. e After three decades of promotion in aggressive advertising and exerted unrelenting campaign against of one type of vegetable oil as political influence on the decisions of saturated fats also brought about more healthy than another, and regulatory authorities. It also seems huge collateral damage to the the unexpected aversion of diet that they were able to sideline the market for foods containing animal consultants to all forms of fat, the publication of unfavourable research fats, which are mostly saturated. market for food oils of all kinds findings about their own products However, there was little retaliatory has declined enormously. is is (about trans fats, for example, until reaction by the United States reflected in the price trend shown the late 1990s) whilst vigorously dairy industry, because it shared in Figure 10-2 (Chapter 10), which publicising any information that processors with the vegetable oil compares coconut, palm, soybean might damage rival products. industry. e processors accepted and peanut oils. Relatively, coconut the lowering of the value of one e marketers of coconut oil for oil has declined a great deal more group of their products, apparently export, scattered throughout the than any other since 1960. When considering this an unavoidable mostly small economies of the dietary sanity returns, it might be compromise. It was the necessary less-developed world, were too expected that the prices of all dietary trade-off to maintain a high price for fragmented and too poorly resourced oils will improve, especially prices of vegetable oils and their derivatives, to mount any effective retaliation in the saturated oils. and to fend off competition from the national media of their principal imported oils. Condemnation of From 1960 onwards, the price of customer countries. the saturated group of fats led, by coconut oil fluctuated wildly in the early 1980s, to broadly accepted response to variable supply, but dietary ‘wisdom’ that a diet low in always showed an overall downward fat—any kind of fat—was the best. trend. Palm oil experienced similar price fluctuations, but producers Twenty years later, it has become countered the negative price trend clear that this is a very unhealthy with a successful yield-improvement diet indeed, and that it has led, effort. Palm oil had become the paradoxically, to an epidemic of new tropical wonder crop, taking

127 the place in investors’ perceptions Some competitor However, elevated cholesterol is but occupied by coconut oil almost products harm health one factor in heart health, and a a century earlier. rough both contentious one at that. Cholesterol breeding and management advances, Recent damage to health, noticed moves back and forth between the palm oil remained profitable. also in several other industrial body tissues and the bloodstream, its countries, has largely been attributed levels fluctuating widely. It is also an e relative success of the oil palm to three causes. essential agent in the functioning of gave rise to a belief that plant human cells and organs, transporting breeders should be able to do e first cause of declining health both protein and fats around the likewise for the coconut palm. It was the reduction in the proportion body. Only a small proportion is now recognised, however, that of saturated fats in the diet, which of the cholesterol in the body is coconut has a lower potential to occurred in response to marketing found in the bloodstream, so a spot produce oil than oil palm. It became claims that they induce disease, check on blood cholesterol could especially clear in the 1980s that particularly coronary heart disease. be misleading as to the whole-body the main reason for the ailing price Such disease was a relatively rare level, and is potentially influenced by of coconut oil was the concerted condition in America until the 1940s, the ingredients of a recent meal. assassination of its reputation by when the campaign for dietary the processors of polyunsaturated change, principally through reduction e second major cause of food oils. What is also emerging in the use of animal fat and coconut deteriorating health in industrialised however, is that the health of oil and their replacement with countries has been the increase in large communities, and indeed unsaturated fats, began in earnest. consumption of trans fats—the fats of the whole United States, has Promotion of unsaturated fats also produced by the process of partial deteriorated greatly during the late paid no heed to the fact that the hydrogenation of unsaturated oil. e 20th century compared with 100, or chemistry of the many saturated fats very thin, or runny, polyunsaturated even 60, years earlier (Gary Taubes, found in different items of food is fats are converted by partial ‘What if it has all been a big fat lie?’ actually highly diverse (Table 11-1). It hydrogenation into firm, artificially New York Times Magazine 7 July is clear some decades later that it was saturated fats, in order to make 2002). e increasing longevity of extremely fanciful to label all saturated margarine and shortening. Such the population relies on enormous fats as posing similar risks—or any trans fats, which are derived from use of medicines. serious risk, for that matter—to any soy, cotton, sunflower, canola and particular aspect of health. maize oils, do not occur naturally ere is evidence that the level of in any food consumed by humans harmful cholesterol in the blood (except for very small amounts of rises temporarily when some related but not identical forms in saturated fats are consumed. dairy fat), and therefore are ‘foreign’

128 molecules entering into the chemistry Coconut helps overcome intake of energy. ere is also some of the body. ere is accumulating obesity remarkable anecdotal evidence that evidence that they are seriously coconut oil has proved to be a dismal harmful to health when consumed Coconut oil, despite being a dietary failure as a commercial fattening in excess of a safe daily amount (set ‘fat’, appears not to contribute to agent when added to the diet of pigs. at 12 grams per day for adults in the obesity, unless consumed in quite Pig farmers in the United States, United Kingdom), and are linked excessive amounts. Coconut oil attracted by the low price, attempted to increased incidence of stroke, in the diet is absorbed into the to fatten their animals using coconut carcinoma (cancer) and obesity. ‘portal’ blood (that part of the oil—but the pigs evidently remained circulatory system that deals with lean and highly active! However, e third cause of health problems uptake of readily available energy when animals are fed unsaturated has been the reduction in the diet of sources in the food passing through fat, including trans fat, they gain lauric, caprylic and capric oils, which the digestive system) and carried weight rapidly. While this is a are found in abundance in coconut to the liver in the same way that boon to the farmer, it changes the oil. ese oils are now known to soluble carbohydrates, such as animal’s fat composition for the play a powerful role in fighting many sugar, are delivered by the insulin worse, making it less healthy for the pathogens in the body. is applies mechanism. From the liver, coconut consumer. to viral, bacterial and protozoan oil is rapidly ‘burned’, which explains pathogens, including a bacterium Racehorses fed a coconut ‘cake’, why people eating a substantial active in stomach ulcers, some containing about 10% coconut amount of coconut in a meal often sexually transmitted disease agents, oil, obtain a high energy level experience a more noticeable rise in and human immunodeficiency and maintain their lean physique. body temperature than after a meal virus (HIV). Laboratory tests Trainers in Australia are showing without coconut. Coconut oil thus and clinical case studies have increasing interest in coconut increases the body’s energy needs, shown that including coconut oil because of the improved sometimes requiring deposited fat oil in the diet helps combat these performance of horses using it. to be burned to meet those needs. pathogens. During digestion, lauric, Could human athletes get the same Far from contributing to obesity, caprylic and capric fatty acids form results by including coconut oil in coconut oil can assist weight loss. monoglycerides, which are active their diets? Research in this area has and evidently powerful germicidal Anecdotal evidence suggests coconut recently been undertaken, but no agents. Part of the great benefit in oil is also a deterrent to excess fat results are available yet. breastfeeding babies arises from the intake, because a quite moderate presence of lauric oil in human breast amount induces a feeling of fullness milk, which provides protection for or satiety when consumed, thereby the infant against infections. providing another mechanism for achieving weight loss by limiting

129 Table 11.2. Summary of coconut assets

Issue Detail Comments 1. Principal oil 50% lauric; 15% shorter-chain; total Highest proportion of medium-chain components components medium-chain oils = 65%. Less than 10% of any oil. Over 90% saturated components. High unsaturated. melting point; solid below 24°C. 2. Outstanding Saturated components withstand high Most stable of all the cooking oils. Others have stability in storage temperature – prolonged use deep more unsaturated components – oxidation at and use frying without change. high temperature spoils flavour. 3. Uptake path in Moves to liver in portal blood supply; All long-chain fats (saturated or not) are carried human body rapid burning for body energy. directly to lipid deposits, accumulating as body fat. 4. Nil demand for Saturated fats have no double bonds Unsaturated fats need protection from oxidation; antioxidants at risk of oxidation, and do not need if protection is inadequate, harmful free radicals are protection from it. released. 5. Lowers harmful Dominant medium-chain oils do not Erroneous perception that coconut oil raises cholesterol enter into lipoprotein (cholesterol) cholesterol due to selective tests with flawed diets; formation; low presence in atheromas.a not suited as sole dietary oil as it lacks essential fatty acids. 6. Stimulates thyroid Depression of body vigour often Evidence that excess unsaturated oil and trans function reversed by adding coconut oil to the fatty acids suppress thyroid function. diet. 7. Counteracts Consistent dietary dose of 50 g per day All forms of long-chain oils are readily accumulated obesity raises energy ‘burning’, lowers appetite, in the body, being ‘burned’ only when energy consumes more stored fats. intake is deficient. 8. Induces an Derivatives of lauric and capric oil Coconut oil is also widely used in ‘heartland’ antibiotic effect on suppress bacterial, fungal and viral cultures on skin wounds. HIV suppression is pathogens pathogens of humans, including HIV. promising, and study continues. 9. High general Myriad possibilities for use: kernel (fresh, Coconut flavour combined with chocolate, ice- attraction as food roasted, flakes, shreds, powder, flour); cream and sugar favoured by most consumers; cream and milk; virgin or RBDb oil. health benefits are a bonus.

130 Issue Detail Comments 10. High melting Excellent ingredient in ice-cream, which Solid in a cool kitchen, and safe against spillage, but point, around maintains firmness longer in a warm like butter should be sold in a tub; readily softened 22–24°C situation. using microwave. 11. Outstanding fuel Coconut oil substitutes for diesel either Especially valuable on isolated tropical islands, oil directly (warm climate), or mixed with where mineral fuel supply is erratic, expensive and diesel or esterified (cool climate). polluting. 12. Popular cosmetic Facial skin responds by remaining soft Widely used in ‘heartland’ cultures; chemical and massage oil and healthy; oil keeps scalp free of stability allows global distribution with no loss of parasites and beautifies hair. potency. a An atheroma is an accumulation of material on the artery wall that usually contains a high proportion of unsaturated fat molecules. Blood flow is slowed by atheromas, triggering coronary disorders. b RBD refers to the industrial procedures for standardising the quality of coconut oil derived from copra: R = refined; B = bleached; and D = deodorised.

131 Diabetes and Restoring the status of discredited. is generates the hope hypothyroidism coconut oil that coconut oil and all its associated food forms will again become widely As coconut oil quickly converts to e struggle to gain widespread used worldwide, to the health and heat energy, it can substitute for recognition of the many great gastronomic benefit of all, as well as sugars as a ready source of energy benefits of coconut oil is far from the economic benefit of the coconut’s without stimulating the release of over, and indeed, in the light of the producers and processors. insulin. A diet in which coconut negative messages spread so widely e time will come when coconut oil is substituted for sugars can by competing marketers, it appears products are freed from the avert extremes in blood sugar to have only just begun. Until opprobrium that has been heaped concentration (hypoglycaemia recently, there were few voices raised upon them in recent decades by and hyperglycaemia) in diabetes in defence of coconut as food. ose those promoting other vegetable sufferers. It would also delay the lipid chemists and health researchers oils. In industrial countries, which development of the resistance of who did speak out often suffered have an enormous media devoted to muscle cells to a rising insulin level attacks on their credibility and food, coconut is bound eventually to that triggers mature-onset diabetes, loss of funding for their research, receive its due acclaim. a common ailment of late middle- particularly in the United States. aged and elderly folk in industrial Such is the power of large industries A coordinated effort to promote societies, and increasingly suffered eager to dominate the marketplace, coconut products by industry by young people who are obese. and such is the dilemma of the authorities and political leaders in producing countries would give e enhanced energy release, scientific research community, which renewed hope to the hundreds accompanied by a rise in body seeks to gain significant funding of millions of coconut farmers. temperature, attributed to the use from industry to continue its work. All that is asked of the countries of coconut stimulates the thyroid e polyunsaturated fat producers’ and industries that compete with gland, which governs the body’s domination of the market was at coconut products is a ‘fair go’ for the metabolism. If we think of the times so thorough that coconut coconut. at is all that is needed body as a motor vehicle, the thyroid consumption fell, even in traditional for the coconut to quickly reclaim its gland acts as the body’s carburettor, coconut cultures like those of true status as a wonder food for all. controlling the idling speed of the southern India. Interestingly, the rate engine. Coconut oil is being widely of coronary heart disease rose! tested by individuals suffering from hypothyroidism, in which thyroid Coconut consumers are now activity is low and the sufferer regaining confidence, as the negative experiences a debilitating lack of messages about coconut oil’s energy. threat to health are systematically

132 The coconut odyssey: the bounteous possibilities of th e tree life

The coconut odyssey the bounteous possibilities of the tree of life

Mike Foale Mike Foale

current spine width is 7mm. If it needs to be adjusted, modify the width of the coconut shells image, which should wrap from the spine to the front cover