The coconut palm (Cocos nucifera) is a member of the family Arecaceae and the only species in the genus Cocos. It is monoecious tree with the female and male flowers on the same inflorescence. There are two types of trees, tall and dwarf. Talls are predominantly cross pollinated, while the dwarfs are predominantly self pollinated. Each leaf axil in a palm produces a spadix or inflorescence which varies from 12 to 15 annually. Inflorescence bears about 30-35 spikelets each one with 250-300 male flowers at its top and one or a few female flowers at the base. The coconut palm is protandrous and male flowers open immediately after splitting of the spadix. Anthesis starts from tip of the distal spikelets and progress towards the bottom (proximal) of the inflorescence. In tall palms, the duration of male phase is about 18-22 days, depending on the palm's characteristics, the growing conditions and the season. It is estimated that an inflorescence contains about 180-360 million pollen grains. The female flowers are comparatively few in number in an inflorescence, about 20-40 in tall palms. Dwarf palms, generally, carry a large number of female flowers in a spadix than that of tall palms. Female flowers become receptive when it opens with three protruding stigmas and nectar is secreted. Female phase is much shorter than the male phase and lasts for about 5-7 days in tall palms and twice as long in some dwarfs. In the coconut tall palm, there is a distinct gap between the male and the female phases aiding cross-pollination. In dwarf palms and hybrids, the interval between the two phases, is either nil or negligible thereby increasing the chances for self-pollination. It takes about 11 to 12 months for the flower to develop to maturity after fertilization. Only about 25 to 40 percent of the female flowers reach maturity.

  Artificial pollination for hybrid production starts with emasculation, the removal of male flowers from the inflorescence of the female parent to avoid self-pollination. To avoid any chance of contamination it is done on the day of inflorescence opening. Bagging of emasculated bunches is required for the entire period of female phase and pollination. Male flowers from an inflorescence are collected 6 to 8 days after opening. Male flowers are then processed to collect pollen. For effecting pollination, pollen is released to cover the female flowers in an inflorescence within the bag. The process is repeated on the 1st, 3rd and 5th day starting from the day when the first female flower comes to receptivity. The bags are removed 2-3 days after completing pollination. Each inflorescence is labelled to complete the artificial pollination.

  Meticulous planning and execution is required to ensure fertilization and nut set on artificial pollination. Supervision and monitoring the pollinators are very important in timely completion of pollination. Record keeping and tracking each palm is essential to increase efficiency of the artificial pollination work. When large number of palms is pollinated using many pollinators monitoring and tracking becomes herculean task. Developing database to aid in the process will make the work more efficient. The database is required to help in decision making and well as in tracking the process of pollination. Based on the above requirement, a database has been developed for managing artificial pollination in coconut.

  The database meets the two requirements of review of work done and planning of future work. Input data includes bunch opening date, bagging date, dates of pollination, number of flowers pollinated, source of pollen, number of nuts set, date of harvest, number of nuts harvested, name pollinator and name of supervisor. Output possible are number of bunches pollinated for a palm, number of female flowers pollinated in bunch and in a palm, percentage of nut set, number of nuts harvested from a bunch and a palm, number of pollination effected by a pollinator, number of nuts obtained per pollinator, number of nuts obtained per male parent etc. In addition to these calculations, the database also helps in decision making by analysing the data of the previous year. It is possible to estimate date of emasculation, bagging, pollination, bag removal etc in advance based on the bunch opening date. Knowing the date on which a particular bunch in a palm has to be emasculated, bagged, pollinated etc., it becomes easier to plan and monitor. The database thus helps in planning pollination work as well as monitoring.