APPENDIX. 309 
3) THE CULTURE OF COCONUTS IN SEYCHELLES AND 
VARIOUS ASPECTS OF AGRICULTURAL METHODS 
ADOPTED IN THAT COLONY. 
Paper by Director of Agriculture, Seychelles—T.C.(C)Ag.17.) 
The culture of the coconut palm, which is supposed to be of 
South American origin, like all other species of the same genus, has 
long been considered as the staple industry in Seychelles. At one 
time it was neglected for the more profitable culture of vanilla which 
was intergrown with the palm; the consequence was that prior to the 
blow given to vanilla some 20 years ago by the synthetic manufacture 
of vanillin, coconut palms in Seychelles were for nearly half a century 
grown in mixed plantations of all sorts of trees which were then used 
as props for vanilla. The young trees set out for use as vanilla props 
soon became as tall as the coconut palms themselves and the whole 
mixed plantation formed a jungle which was certainly the cause of 
the coconut palms being attacked by many diseases and pests. 
Coconut palms are so hardy that they were able to resist this ill- 
treatment which would have been fatal to many other plants. 
Vanilla on the other hand, requiring shade for its growth and 
benefitting so largely from the mulch formed by coconut husks and 
leaves, was found to thrive under these conditions which, however, 
would have meant, in the long run, the complete destruction of the 
coconut palms. 
For the last 15 years the coconut plantations have been cleared 
from jungle growth except cinnamon bushes, which are left in order 
to secure an annual crop of leaves used for distillation and worth 
about B25 a ton. It is fortunate however that cinnamon does not 
grow on the coral plateaux (the name ‘‘ plateau ” is given here to 
the flat portions of the coast where sea sand has been piled up) as 
these plateaux are the ideal spots for coconut culture. On the hill 
sides coconut palms also thrive owing to the easy percolation of rain 
water carrying food elements but the tendency is to retain cinnamon 
bushes there so as to have an intercalary crop and thus continue the 
traditional habit of growing two crops at the same time. It is 
however more and more realised nowadays that coconut palms do 
better without intercalary crops and that cinnamon should be 
relegated to the summits where the coconut is handicapped by 
permanent moisture and stiff soil. Under the shade of the coconut 
palms, which are now manured, it has been found that herbaceous 
plants like patchouli and ginger not requiring props are less injurious 
to the coconut and so the system of intercalary crops, so dear to 
many planters, has thus been maintained. It is not always easy nor 
useful to combat agricultural methods and ideas which have been 
handed down from generation to generation especially when planters 
who are mostly descendants from the old French planters of 
Mauritius and Reunion are not altogether ignorant and have acquired 
much practical knowledge. 
It is however satisfactory that the agricultural methods are 
better adjusted now that herbaceous plants instead of trees are 
intergrown with coconut palms. The former policy was naturally 
the cause of the coconut palms being weakened and diseased nearly 
to the verge of extinetion. Various forms of bud rot and bud decay,