CASHEW PRODUCTION TECHNIQUES IN NIGERIA

FIRST STEP

1. Choose a good hybrid seeds.

This is where the success and failure of your cashew farm is determined.
Normally, ogbomoso has the best cashewnut in the world and also the best planting varieties.
A good seeds should be purchased

The second steps is as well important to reduce the mortality rate of the nut when planted.

Fill up the black polythene bag with well treated soil.
How do you treat your soil? by exposing it to heat.
You can bag your soil and place it inside hot water for 5 minutes
The next step is to sort your seeds.
how do you do that?
Prepare a bowl filled with water and pour the amount of cashew seeds that can contain the bowl.

After pouring,the nuts that floats are not viable and should not be planted while the ones that settled at the bottom should be planted.

Planting the floating ones will lead to wasted time and effort because it won't germinate.


Allow the settled cashew seeds to stay in the water for 24 hours before planting.

Fill the black polythene bag with the treated soil and plant the seed.


The next step is to start grafting.
You have to pay attention here because this is the most delicate part of it which you should not missed.

Before we proceed, let me explain what grafting means, the advantage of grafting over direct seeding, why you should go for grafted seedlings over ordinary seedlings, etc

The layman meaning of grafting is taking a part ( it's called scion) of a tree with desirable characteristics and Joining it with another (it's called root stock) to get early maturing, fast growing, and better yield.

Get a good scion.
The scion in the picture above is gotten from a parent tree with fast growing,high yielding and bigger nuts
Now, after the seedlings have grown for some weeks, you can now start the grafting process.

cut the flowering top of the seedlings, and get your scion in a moist state.

To get a successful grafted seedlings, you need to add some water with your scion and wrap it with a paper to keep the scion always moist especially if you will be travelling a long distance with the scion.

Remembered when I travelled to an African country to get a mango variety that produce triple size of the normal mango size in the market, I had a success rate of 40% because I did not moisten it well.

Cut with a sharp knife about 1cm deep into the rootstock
Tie both the scion and the rootstock together, after doing this, cover with a white transparent nylon and tied with rope.

After some days, the scion and rootstock should have gel together.

You can remove nylon after some weeks.


LAND PREPARATION AND SPACING

The first thing to do is to clear the land before using tractor to plough.

Spacing depends on whether you are cultivating cashew alone or intercropping with vegetables, cassava etc.
Though when the cashew is fully grown, it won't be advisable. Only crops such as vegetables that tolerate shade will strive under a cashew tree shade.


My advice is to always intercrop cashew with cassava or vegetables.