Architexters

Palm family is unique in the aspect that most of its members have muli purpose benefits to the mankind, unrivalled by few other trees. There are several palm species such as Borassus, Areca, Sago, Fish Tail etc. Because of their beautiful structure, many of the palms adorn gardens.Though pal trees grow very tall, they can also be raised in home gardens or as dwarfs in pots.One of the most important palm trees is the Sugar palm.Botanically known as Borassus Flabellifer; it is widely distributed in the tropics such as India, Srilanka, South East Asia, New Guinea etc.

People from temperate regions are not much aware of this palm and hence are not privileged as people of tropics in appreciating the multi fold benefits of this palm. The tree grows upto 30 meters in height, with separate sexes. The female trees bear edible fruits of about 20 cm diameter.

Over a lifecycle starting from fruit to tree, the sugar palm or toddy palm provides six types of edible portions at different stages. The immature or unripe fruits contain 2-3 locules, and the locules contain a hydrolyzed carbohydrate which is very tasty. (Called ‘munji’ in Telugu language). On maturity the carbohydrates convert to hard starch and this starch is not edible. The locules are in hard shells, which are covered by fibrous material, and this fibrous material which was earlier greenish-whitish in color and tasteless, accumulates sugar and turns orange-red juicy fibres.

This sweet orange juice with characteristic flavor (fruit at this stage called ‘tati pandu’ in telugu), is mixed with flour and baked into cakes. If the ripened fruit is left untouched, the fruit falls to the ground and the seeds (or locules) generate a peg geotropically into the soil. The seed, which has hard starchy material, gets again hydrolyzed into sugars and takes the form of semi solid white mass (the seed on ground with peg into the soil at this stage is called ‘burra gunju’ in telugu). If this stage is not disturbed, the hydrolyzed starch gets transferred through the peg inside the soil and forms a cotyledon.

Once the transfer of sugars is complete, the cotyledon which measures 1-2 cm in thickness and 15-25 cm in length and of conical shape is again edible (this stage is called ‘tega’ in Telugu). If this stage is also not harmed, the cotyledon gives rise to a new palm. While the earlier edible stages namely munji, tati pandu, burra gunju and tega are derived from fruits, there are two other edibles that can be derived from the reserve material stored near the apical bud of the tree. The reserve material which sustains the growth of the tree and much helpful in reproductive stage, is very sweet and looks like a cylindrical white portion with several layers.

The inner the layer, the sweeter it is (this cylindrical sweet portion is called ‘muvva’ or ‘movvu’ in Telugu. The sixth edible derived is called the toddy (‘kallu’ in telugu) is derived from this apical bud, by making an incision. From this incision, the liquid food material that is part of the plant’s translocation is tapped and this is an intoxicating and energy giving drink.

Apart from the edible uses, there are several other benefits which man has been using since time immemorial. The leaves are used for thatching and making mats. The leaf stalks have tough fibers, which are twined to make tough ropes for building of houses, boats, etc.The dried shells, leaf stalks are used as fuel. The trunks are used either as live poles in construction of thatch sheds, or as timber in replacement for wooden poles.The trunk of the tree is hollowed, and is directly used as a boat (called ‘dhone’ in telugu) for travel and fishing in many parts of the tropics.

Thus the Sugar Palm or Palmyra Palm or Toddy Palm is unrivalled even in the palm family, for the multi-fold benefits it offers in its life time at different stages.Apprecating this Indian’s give it the status of ’son’ for it takes care of them single handedly even in hard times.

Ravikumar Uppaluri hails from Kaikalur, Krishna District of Andhra Pradesh State in India.The famous Kolleru bird sancturay, a fresh water lake that attracts birds from as far as Siberia, is located near Kaikalur. Kolleru lake once vast , beautiful and sheltering scores of birds and other animals is on the verge of extinction. The author Holds a Masters degree in Agricultural Sciences and is cofounder of an organization involved in Nature conservation and sustainable development. The author can be reached at uravikumar@yahoo.com.

Planning a garden is relatively easy if you have a “blank canvas” on which to draw your design, although there are still plenty of things to consider if you don’t want to wish later that you’d done more planning and less doing! One of the major considerations is how much time you can or want to spare to look after your garden.

The Boundary

Assuming that you have neighbours and need or want to demark your boundary, what do you want to look at? Trees? A hedge? A fence? Let’s consider a few alternatives.

• Wire fence – not pretty but you can grow climbing plants up it and bushes in front and eventually, it will become invisible (and so will your neighbours).
• Wood panel fencing – not too bad to look at but you will need to paint or spray on some sort of preservative. Creosote is quite cheap but smells horrible and damages plants (don’t forget there may be some on the other side of the fence). Other preservatives cost a bit more but come in a variety of colours so you can have a light or dark wood or even green or blue if you want. This will need redoing every couple of years depending on weather conditions where you live. If you have concrete posts and the panels need replacing, you can just slide the old ones out and the new ones in. Wooden posts need to be embedded in cement as do concrete ones but wooden ones frequently rot so you will need to replace the post and dig out and replace the cement.
• Wooden rail and overlapping plank fencing – each plank needs to be nailed to the horizontal rails. It looks nice but also needs a protective coating. It can be cheap and easy to repair if only a few planks rot at a time.
• A hedge. No matter what you choose in terms of hedge plants, you will need to clip your hedge at least once a year to keep it tidy. When choosing, you need to decide whether you want evergreen or deciduous, how tall you want it to be, what soil it needs and how quickly you want it to grow. My advice would be to choose something which will grow to the required height and no more and only needs annual pruning. Don’t forget that conifers such as Leylandii grow very quickly and can lose foliage at the bottom if they’re not kept in check. In addition, nothing else will grow below them and they may well end up blocking out both your and your neighbours’ light, particularly if your garden is not large.

Grass

Do you want a lawn? Bear in mind that it will need watering in dry spells, feeding about twice a year, mowing at least once a week in the growing season (including tidying up the edges), aerating occasionally, scarifying to remove the dead bits underneath and worse still, kept weed free. On the plus side, mowing etc. can be very therapeutic and satisfying, a well-kept lawn is lovely underfoot and much nicer to look at than concrete. Of course you can always invest in Astroturf for the same effect!

Hard Landscaping

If you ever saw the popular TV series “Ground Force”, you will know that there are endless possibilities for hard landscaping. You can have a paved patio or a wooden deck, raised flower beds of stone or brick, or terraced flower beds and steps if your garden slopes. Ou can have paths of gravel or pebbles or coloured slate or stepping stones. You can have pebbly or gravelled areas with artistic arrangements of plant-filled pots, coloured china balls and any other garden ornament you can think of. How about a deck or other seating area away from the house to catch the last of the evening sun?

Decorative Bits and Hiding Horrors

Right at the start is a good time to decide on other structures too. Are you going to grow climbers? How about a pergola or an archway? Do you want trelliswork? Where are you going to keep that mower and all the other tools you’ll need? A garden shed? One of those plastic cabinets? Do you want this storage to be visible or nicely camouflaged? Are you going to grow vegetables and if so, do you want your veg bed and/or greenhouse hidden behind some nice climbers? After all, tomatoes and runner beans may taste good but they’re not very attractive to gaze at over your well-earned glass of wine at the end of a hard day’s gardening!

Watch out for the next article on choosing your planting.

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Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to Gardening
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