ELEPHANT TREES

Taranaki Daily News, 28 December 1929, Page 24 (Supplement)

ELEPHANT TREES

Few people 'have heal’d of an Elephant tree, yet that is the literal translation of the Greek name Thytelephas, which naturalists have seen fit to bestow upon a palm tree peculiar to Central America. It has been so called because of the extraordinary likeness which its ripe seeds bear to ivory, both in colour and texture; in fact, they are commonly referred to as ivory nuts. Thousands of tons of ivory nuts are annually shipped to the United States and Europe, where they are turned into huttons and other useful or fancy articles. These articles, when thoroughly polished, aro so hard that few think that they grew on a tree, thousands of miles away in the tropics of Colombia, Ecuador oi’ Northern Peru. Tho trees are a kind of palm, but not the familiar tall and stately type, for their trunks seldom reach more than six feet above the ground. In the same manner that elephants romp in herds, so tiro ivory palm is generally found in groves and seldom alone or among other trees.

Ivory nuts do not grow singly but in large woody, ball-like shells, weighing as much as twenty-fivo pounds, and being as large as a man’s head. One treo bears, at the same time, as many as six or eight of these “heads,” and cadi head contains about fifty nuts, which are in groups of “drupes” of some six or seven.

When young they contain a clear and insipid fluid, which becomes milky and sweet as the nut ripens. At this later stage the fluid forms a not unpleasant drink, but it quickly thickens and solidifies, until finally it is as hard as ivory. Unfortunately the nuts are not very large, .only averaging the size of hens’ eggs, so they can only be used for

small articles. The local Indians carve them into all sorts of queer little ornaments and toys, finger rings being very popular. The nuts have different names in each of the districts in which they are found, being known as “tagua’ along the Magdalena River; “anta" along the Darien coast, and “pullipunto” or “homcro” in Peru. In the trade they are often spoken of as “corozo,” but this more correctly refers to another nut somewhat similar.

Life is very primitive in the land of the ivory palm and many of the nuts find their way to civilisation through Indians bartering them at the nearest store, possibly for a knife or other article. In due course they journey down to the coast, through hundreds of miles of steaming creeks in canoes, or through mile after mile of tropical jungle. Loaded on to large dugouts they then make a dash through the surf to the small coasting steamer which brings them mainly to Panama, where they are transhipped for their final ocean journey of some 3000 or 4000 miles. ®