Wine palm plantation a failure?

Seeds, not plantations, best bet to propagate

Narsa Goud, leader of Toddy Tappers Society, shows the few wine palm saplings which took root in the plot near Eedula Sawargaon in Adilabad district.

Expecting an excellent rate of sapling survival from plantation drives, like the ongoing Telanganaku Haritha Haram, seems to be a fallacy, if the opinion of experts is anything to go by.

“We planted about 9,000 saplings of the wine palm in an 8-acre area near Eedula Sawargaon village in Tamsi mandal of Adilabad district during 2016 and 2017 and achieved a survival rate of as low as 20%,” disclosed Potharam Narsa Goud, a former president of Adilabad Toddy Tappers Society.

“The rate of germination of seeds of wine palm on the other hand is very good at more than 90%,” the toddy tappers’ leaders pointed out. “Most of these seeds were sourced locally,” he added.

Re-look needed

This ‘revelation’ necessitates that authorities take a re-look at plantation of wine palm saplings in Adilabad in order to save the exercise from turning a failure. The Excise and Prohibition Department has a target of planting 14.5 lakh saplings during the current year in old undivided Adilabad district of which about 40% has already been achieved.

“Saplings belonging to a given species need to be propagated in that area itself if desired rate of survival is to be achieved,” observed Botanist E. Narasimha Murthy from Satavahana University, Karimnagar. He was discussing the failure of wine palm saplings planted at Eedula Sawargaon.

“The failure is perhaps due to non availability of water,” guessed an official of the Excise and Prohibition Department which has the task of planting wine palm saplings under the THH. The guess looks more like an excuse, given the fact there are a couple of water bodies in the vicinity, and one of it has water during summer months too.

The failure stands out like a sore thumb considering the fact the area in question has hundreds of naturally grown wine palm. In fact the village got its suffix ‘Eedula’ due to the abundance of wine palm trees which are called ‘eetha’ in Telugu.

“Yes, the excellent germination of seeds conforms with the laws of nature. Nature has its own scheme of things for propagation of different species of trees through seeds,” Mr. Murthy observed.

The departments which are executing the THH need to select species keeping in mind their compatibility with local soil, climate and rainfall, the Botanist suggested. “There will be no use bull dozing alien species, alien could even mean brought from neighbouring district in some cases,” he cautioned.