Comments on: Lightning strikes coconuts twice (and more)

By: Tangled Bank 95: Here I stand and can do no other « Ouroboros

Tangled Bank 95: Here I stand and can do no other « Ouroboros — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 19:37:27 +0000

[...] challenges; to make matters worse, they also have to deal with the wrath of Zeus and Thor. In Lightning strikes coconuts twice (and more), Luigi Guarino describes a threat to gene-banking that comes from an unexpected direction. It never [...]

By: Hugh

Hugh — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 08:19:30 +0000

Reginald Child, who was Director of coconut research in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) in the 1940s, was writing the first edition of his text book on coconuts for Longmans in the 1960s, when he visited his old stamping ground and was shown the results of the then recent research into prepotent palms. These were a small number of super-selected palms that would transmit their good qualities when used as pollen parents in hybrid production. Noting their age and height, he recommended they be fitted with lightning conductors. About 10 years later, when writing the second edition and visiting the coconut germplasm collection in Jamaica, he offered the same advice on our selections but admitted that it had not been followed in Sri Lanka, where some of the prepotent palms had succumbed. Nor has it been implemented in Jamaica – but losses there have been due to hurricanes and LY disease.

By: A mighty wind at Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

A mighty wind at Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog — Sun, 16 Dec 2007 06:44:20 +0000

[...] recent post about lighting strikes in a coconut genebank was picked up by the excellent Coconut Google Group and generated some interesting responses. In [...]