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2006-12-11 02:01:09 · 13 answers · asked by katie o 1 in Food & Drink Other - Food & Drink

13 answers

Yes, it grows on a tree.

2006-12-11 02:03:14 · answer #1 · answered by Cuddly Lez 6 · 0 0

Though its name suggests that it is a nut, I've always regarded coconut as a fruit. When the coconut is young, it has properties like fruit, and as it matures, it becomes more nutty. But in fact it is not a nut or a fruit; it is a seed.

Unless it is picked, a matured coconut eventually drops from the tree. The fully developed hard shell does not crack easily. Dry and brown, the coconut may sit underneath the tree for months and appear as if it were dead, until one day a green shoot pushes its way out of the shell. The whole time the old coconut has been sitting under the tree, changes have been slowly taking place inside. At one end of the coconut (where the eyes are), an embryo starts growing, feeding off the juice and nutrition of the thick white flesh. This embryo develops into a creamy mass that gradually fills much of the empty space inside. It is good to eat – sweet, somewhat spongy and less fibrous than the matured meat.

The embryo eventually sprouts out of the shell and becomes a young coconut seedling. At this point, the plant can survive for several more weeks or months on the food and water inside as roots gradually develop and extend out of the shell to anchor the plant in the ground. Nutritious coconut meat can sustain life for a long time; one of my students, who is a horticulturist, has successfully used coconut milk to nurse seedlings of other plants in his greenhouse. Coconut palms lead a long productive life. They begin bearing fruits at the age of five to seven years and continue to do so until they are seventy to eighty years old.

As complete seed packages, coconuts have been known to travel to faraway lands to find new homesteads. Stories abound of coconuts floating their way across seas and oceans to be washed ashore on distant islands, rooting themselves in handsome groves to greet visiting humans in search of paradise. The dehusked coconuts you buy at the supermarket, however, are no longer productive seed packages. Once the husk is removed, the seed dies.

2006-12-11 02:06:54 · answer #2 · answered by michelleleea2 3 · 0 0

Well actually it is a seed, as it comes in the shop. So the whole coconut with its thick skin of fibre is the fruit of the coconut palm

2006-12-11 02:08:54 · answer #3 · answered by Christy R 1 · 0 0

The definition of fruit is, the part of the plant that holds the seed. Which makes a tomato, cucumber, peas, beans and alot of others, fruits rather than vegitables... Yes it is a fruit by definition.

2006-12-11 02:10:52 · answer #4 · answered by Joseph K 2 · 0 0

A coco nut is a 'seed' of a fruit. Instead of eating the flesh - as thick layer of coarse fibers which we throw away - we eat the inside of the seed.

2006-12-11 02:06:21 · answer #5 · answered by MM 4 · 0 0

Yes.

2006-12-11 04:14:50 · answer #6 · answered by Angel 2 · 0 0

Yes.

2006-12-11 02:03:35 · answer #7 · answered by Mujer Bonita 6 · 0 0

yes, it is the fruit of the palm tree

2006-12-11 02:03:37 · answer #8 · answered by Jenny A 6 · 0 0

yes

2006-12-11 02:03:47 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0 0

my coconuts are, two aday keeps ur girlfriend away.

2006-12-11 02:07:40 · answer #10 · answered by Dr King 1 · 0 0

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