Want to grow a "lovely bunch of coconuts?" It's a process...

Entry by Blair Rynearson
April 2017

Now is time to start planting what is arguably the most important part of any Sri Lankan homegarden - the coconut trees. Sri Lanka has numerous varieties of coconut, and the people consume them frequently, in almost everything. After five months of living and working in Pitakele, I can still use one hand to count the number of times I’ve had a meal without some form of coconut.

There are coconuts for drinking, and coconuts for eating. In Sri Lanka, coconuts for drinking are known as “tambili”, and there are many varieties – at least five are planted in the Pitakele area. Coconuts grown for their meat are equally diverse. There are coconuts that reach more than 60 ft in height, and dwarf coconuts that grow no taller than 10 ft. Our garden will house a mix of both locally grown varieties, and improved varieties procured from agricultural research stations. We will plant a higher than normal load of the drinking variety, as foreign researchers find them to be very refreshing on a hot day.

I assumed that planting coconuts would be the same as any other tree. How wrong I was. Spacing between coconuts needs to account for the sprawling fronds. the Coconut Research Institute of Sri Lanka (CRISL) recommends a spacing of twenty to twenty-five feet! And the hole excavated for planting a coconut seedling is wildly disproportionate to the size of the root mass. Most seedlings at the time of planting have a root system comprised of the intact coconut, and a few thick roots protruding from the husk. Yet, the CRISL recommends that the young coconut should be planted in a hole no smaller than 4x4x4 feet. That’s almost the size of a grave. It is rare that you don’t run into a few rocks while digging a hole of that breadth. What’s more, planting should occur at the onset of the monsoon. This means that it’s hot and humid. As I dug the holes with my friend and coworker Tilakaratne, I sweat a disgusting amount. Tilakaratne repeatedly asked if I’d been swimming, or whether it was raining, which I didn’t find to be particularly amusing. And the sweat attracted elephant flies (think horseflies on steroids), quite literally turning insult to injury.

Tillekaratne in a partially excavated coconut hole

Someratna navigates the kekila fern to locate coconut planting sites

But it doesn’t end there. The very same CRISL recommends that you line the base of the pit with two layers of coconut husks. These must be hauled to the holes, in addition to even more coconut husks that will be used as mulch when the planting is finished. So after lining the hole with a layer of husks, followed by dirt, followed by a second layer of husks, you arrive at the point where you can fill the hole with soil.

The CRISL is not happy with just any soil - they recommend mixing topsoil with 10 kg of cattle or

Compost purchased for planting

goat manure, 1 kg of dolomite and 1 kg of young palm mixture (2 parts urea, 3 parts saphos phosphate, 2 parts muriate of potash). Thankfully, things in Sri Lanka are comparatively cheap. I purchased 10 bags of “compost,” each sack weighing 20 kg, for a grand total of $23. In this case “compost,” is composted cattle and goat manure mixed with dolomite. All that was missing was the the young palm mixture, and I purchased a 20kg sack of a similar product for $10. After the truck dropped the supplies at the base of the foot bridge leading to the research station, we threw the sacks on our shoulders and carried them 200 yards to the house. Following that, we hauled the compost to the planting site, in addition to an equally large sack of topsoil taken from near the forest edge (this is to supplement the poor soils on the kekila fern slopes). At which point we mixed the soil, compost and fertilizer.

 

A coconut seedling ready for planting

A small hole was made in the soil mixture and the coconut and nascent root system were buried. To support the seedling, Tilakaratne buttressed it between a tripod of three sticks, secured with a vine that comes from the stem of a species of pitcher plant (Nepenthes distallatoria). Per recommendation of CRISL, coconut husks were placed around the seedling as mulch. This step differs from local tradition - people in the Pitakele area place rocks rather than coconut husks around the seedling. Tilakaratne fears that the husks might attract termites which will attack the seedling. This might have merit, we plan to plant some with rock covering and others with coconut husks as an experiment. The final step of planting involves sprinkling a bag of salt around the tree to discourage attack from termites and black beetles. 

A fully planted coconut seedling!

But it’s not over. Predation of coconut seedlings by a healthy wild boar population is a common occurrence in the Sinharaja area. The boar are attracted to the nut buried under the ground. They typically uproot the plant and eat the roots, effectively killing the young coconut seedling. To ensure maximum survival, each individual coconut tree requires fencing. This inspired a trip to the forest edge to fell a smallish alstonia tree (Alstonia macrophylla), which will be used for posts. The tree is cut in half, and the small logs hauled to the the planted coconut where it is further cut down to the size of fence posts. Four holes are dug with a rock bar, the posts placed, and PVC coated, galvanized chicken wire is strung and nailed. And that’s it. One down out of the twenty coconuts that we intend to put in the ground.