Messages In Christening

First conservatory coconut plantation on the atoll of Tetiaroa

In June 2009, the company Beachcomber SA and the family of Marlon Brando gave their agreement to integrate the atoll of Tetiaroa in a conservation project Polynesian coconut varieties. Practically, four to five remote locations, or motu peninsula, will each be replanted with a single variety. Thanks to the geographic isolation of these places, not coconuts will cross between members of the same variety of certified seed will be produced and disseminated. Four or five varieties of coconut are well preserved on Tetiaroa.
In April 2010, although no funding dedicated to this activity by the government, the first plantings of the conservatory began Tetiaroa. Coconut seeds were planted horned one small motu Tetiaroa.
The operation has not been easy, because the coconut trees were planted in half barrels of metal; the bottom of the rusted barrels was pierced by the roots of the coconut palm, making it difficult to impossible for manual unloading of coconuts. This allowed us to realize the extreme strength of the roots of coconut, which play an important role in the fight against erosion côtière.Nous therefore have to resort to "mass media" and banged drums using a machine pallet forks.

coconut seedlings were then "stripped" the reduction of leaf area has the advantage of limiting evapotranspiration and facilitates recovery. Then they were transported by boat on a stormy sea, to the place of planting. It was decided not to publicly disclose the exact location of this plantation, to limit the risk of theft of this plant material extremely rare. There are currently on this motu coconut trees will be gradually destroyed when plants coconut horned come into production.

To constitute a population of coconut conservatory, we generally recommend selecting twenty to fifty parental palms belonging to the same variety. Two to four descendants of each parent were planted in a geographically isolated. The relatively high number of parents limit the rate of inbreeding in subsequent generations. Crosses between related parties generate deleterious effects and a consequent reduction in vigor and fruit production.
Given the extreme rarity of coconut with horns, it will not be possible to find twenty parents with the required characteristics. For now, only eight horned coconuts were reported in French Polynesia. We recommend getting seed from at least four different horn to coconut, so as to limit the deleterious crossovers between related parties in the next generation.
Contacts have been made to obtain seed from Raiatea and Tahaa. We recommended
further seed collection on coconut horned Tetiaroa. Nicolas Leclerc said that all the nuts produced by the coconut does not wear horns. Coconuts horns were stolen by some workers who Tetiaroa them back as souvenirs. We emphasized that the nuts of the coconut palms hornless horned i must also be germinated. Around the fruit, which bears the stuffing horns, is a tissue of maternal origin only. The absence or presence of horn shall affect not on the genetic nature of the embryo of the seed. A coconut from the coconut without horn to horn just as likely to give a coconut palm coconut a nut horn to horn (phew!). To avoid confusion and promote self-fertilization, it is better to remove all the blossoms and fruits five or six trees that surround the coconut horned. Thus all seeds collected at the foot of the coconut to horn will be well from this tree.
Because the system of cross fertilization of coconut, nuts harvested coconuts gaff will not all coconut trees in horn. It will perform a selection among the plants when they begin to bear fruit, and probably eliminate some of them. Anyway, the genes will be preserved, even if they do not speak to one hundred percent. In future generations, we come gradually to form a population where all individuals will bear horns.