INTRODUCTION TO MR. GALBRAITH’S PAPER.
By D. G. Fairchild.
The following paper on vanilla culture has been prepared by Mr. S. J. Galbraith, of Mahé, Seychelles Islands, who was for some time associated with Mr. W. T. Swingle, agricultural explorer of the Section of Seed and Plant Introduction, in the preparation of a joint memoir on the culture and disease of vanilla in those islands.
As the second part of the report, which deals with the disease, has not been completed, it seems desirable not to delay longer the publication of this part, relating to vanilla culture, inasmuch as it is practically complete in itself.
Although the vanilla is a plant native to America, its culture is now carried on most extensively and successfully in Bourbon, Seychelles, Mauritius, Madagascar, and other islands lying in the Tropics in the Indian Ocean east of Africa, as well as in the Island of Tahiti in the South Pacific.
The vanilla industry is a very important one in the Seychelles Islands, and Mr. Galbraith, himself for many years a successful planter, is in a most favorable position to write on the subject of vanilla culture.
The vanilla is a climbing orchid, the nearly mature pod of which is the part known to trade and that which furnishes vanilla flavoring. The plant grows wild only in the Tropics, and is so sensitive to cold that its culture can be successful only in regions absolutely free from frost.
The recent annexation of the Hawaiian Islands, Puerto Rico, and other tropical territory has added to our domain regions which there is reason to believe will prove admirably suited to the cultivation of this plant.
The competition of artificial vanilla, prepared synthetically by chemical methods, has not proved to be of any considerable importance. Indeed, the price of good vanilla has risen during recent years probably because of the ravages of disease in the islands where it is principally grown.
Prospective growers will be greatly aided in finding suitable climates and soil by Mr. Galbraith’s recommendations on these points.
The disease mentioned in various places in this bulletin is the one described in the second as yet unpublished part of the original memoir. It is of fungous origin, of great destructiveness, and spreads during moist hot weather very rapidly, frequently causing total destruction of large plantations in a month. During recent years it has seriously crippled the vanilla industry in Seychelles, Bourbon, and other islands of the Indian Ocean. This malady spreads with extraordinary rapidity where plants are crowded and allowed to intertwine, and for this reason Mr. Galbraith advises against close planting, though in regions free from the disease such culture might well prove more profitable than the methods here advocated.
Without going into details, it may be unhesitatingly affirmed from the results of Mr. Galbraith’s very thorough and painstaking studies that the malady is of such great destructiveness, spreads so rapidly, and is so difficult to control, that it would, if ever introduced, ruin probably forever the prospects of successful vanilla culture in our new territories.
It becomes, then, a matter of absolutely vital importance to keep the disease out of Hawaii and Puerto Rico if it is ever proposed to grow vanilla there.
No surer method of destroying in advance the hope of establishing this highly profitable industry could be conceived than that of carrying out the first thought that would occur to an enterprising prospective cultivator, viz, of sending to the islands of the Indian Ocean, where vanilla culture is most highly developed, for a stock of plants to use in starting a vanillery.
The only possible way of safeguarding our new domains against this disease is to prohibit absolutely the introduction of living vanilla plants except by the Government, and then only after inspection by a competent plant pathologist.
Fortunately vanilla plants may be multiplied very rapidly if placed under favorable conditions, and from a small stock of disease-free plants it would soon be possible to stock all the islands.
The Secretary of Agriculture proposes to secure such perfectly healthy plants for distribution to planters wishing to experiment with vanilla culture, and it is hoped that meanwhile, in the absence of any definite legislation on the subject, public opinion will prevent any promiscuous importation of vanilla cuttings.
As soon as the plants begin to yield pods the services of an expert should be secured to superintend the curing, for which specially constructed apparatus is required, and to report on the quality of the product.
There is every prospect for the successful establishment of vanilla culture in Hawaii and Puerto Rico, provided suitable soils and climates be found, and provided the disease be excluded. Certainly an industry which yielded to the small island of Tahiti in 1897 $172,295, to the Seychelles $246,600 in 1897, and to Réunion $560,563 in 1892 is worthy the serious attention of prospective cultivators. The desirability of publishing a practical paper on the subject at this time is emphasized by the conviction that both Hawaii and Puerto Rico offer suitable fields for the introduction of this industry.