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Coconut germinating after only 3 weeks

15 years ago

I have seen other people posting about their successes/failure germinating coconuts and just thought I would share my (albeit short) experience.

Bought 2 coconuts and looked them over carefully for obvious damage or deep cuts. Both had loads of milk inside. One of them had what I thought was possible germination already (one of the eyes was bulging out and was soft, but was brown). I buried them halfway in the soil, eyes facing straight up. I put one in a cupboard with a desk lamp (temp = about 100 F) and the other outside (been mostly 70-80 here lately).

The one with the bulging eye soon rotted (white fungus, eye popped out revealing a hole, and then a squirrel somehow took the stinky thing away!). But the one in the cupboard has, after only 3 weeks, pushed a new whitish/cream colored growth out one of the eyes. Success! (so far).

I'm happy with this for a first try. Forgive if this seems awfully amateur-ish, but I had seen some posts from people who had tried and tried and tried and always failed with coconuts and thought I would share this.

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Comments (4)

fruitof76
15 years ago
That's good news for you. I too have been inspired by others here to try this. I planted 6 coconuts, 3 in husks, 3 without the husk.

For my seeds, I soaked in water for a day or so, checking to see which side floated to the top. Planted halfway into soil with the top side up and put outside back in March.

So far, 1 has germinated and pushed out a sprout. It is from a coconut without a husk. Very neat.
va_canuck
Original Author
15 years ago
I should add I soaked the coconuts for a day prior to planting. I thought about planting them "floaty side up" but I also read about people who had success with "eyes side up".

We'll see.
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bestdankinftpiercefl
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Congrats! That is very quick! After 6 months I finally had my first coconut sprout today. All I did was plant it half way down in the sand. So far 1 of 50.

I also had some Joey Palm , Redneck, and Royal sprouts all get noticed today! Here is a link to my other sprout pics if you want to check them out.

Here is a link that might be useful: New Palm Sprout Pics
crazycoconut
14 years ago
I bought a coconut from a supermarket in Montreal Canada 3 weeks ago and didn't know whether I should eat it or try growing it. After almost a week I removed it from its plastic wrapping and gave it a shake listening to all its milk swishing around inside. I thought to myself.."how can I get this thing to grow without a husk???" First thing I did was soak it in very hot water everyday for 2 weeks. I would then remove it from sitting in water for up to 3 hours a day and place it inside a sealed plastic bag (to trick it into thinking the plastic bag was its husk) with lots of air inside. I then sat it with its 3 eyes pointed up inside the bag and mounted onto a coffee cup into a corner of the room. Everyday I would continue the hot water procedure and then put it back into its bag sitting on the coffee cup. After about a week of doing this 1 of the 3 flat eyes suddenly swelled up and popped out like a nipple. After a couple days of putting it into the hot water bath..suddenly (today) the nipple wood gave way and behind it was a white sprout like a potato's eye sprout. This is where the story ends because I'm going to plant it and watch what happens..but so far my "grocery store" coconut is showing promise. The idea is to trick it into believing that it has its husk by placing it into a sealed tight plastic bag and letting the humidity increase around it and kick it into action. I will keep you all posted! :-)

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