Cacao Survivors

So not all of the beans that sprouted are doing well.  I resorted the cups into probability of survival.  That would seem a little heartless if these weren't plants but in the world of plants it's normal.  Often you will plant multiple seeds in a single location and remove the plants that are weaker and merely throw them away.  This is especially true with flowers and vegetable plants.

So in the bottom left (which is the bottom right usually but I'm tried to make sure all the trees were visible in this shot) you have the obvious dud.  He's already dead and starting to rot.

The front 8 I really have very little hope for.  As you go down the line though you can easily see many of the trees are doing well.  Over half have leaves forming although none of them are really "set" yet.  By that I mean they are still in the formation stage where it's still easy for them to get shocked and fall off.  My revised estimate is that from 10-12 of these 40 plants will not make it.  That still leaves 28-30 viable trees though.  Not bad for putting seeds in dirt and remembering to water them.  Of course soon the'll need a lot more dirt and bigger pots and better locations for growth.  Fortunately I work in a large enough office that there are plenty of places for that to happen.  My current hope is to have enough trees to have a small crop in a few years and be the first person to go from planting the trees to bonbons, at least in Texas.  There are already some in Hawaii and some in other countries that do this, like Che'il Mayan Products, Nina Chocolates, and Loiza Dark.  But here trees have to be grown indoors making it a bit more difficult to keep them healthy and productive.