A coconut has incredible tolerance to the salt environment and poor sandy soil. Coconuts can float for thousands of miles until they are cast up onto a sandy shore. After lying a while in the heat of the tropical sunshine, the coconut eventually sprouts into life. Roots sprout out of two of the eyes in the nut, reaching down into the sand for water and nutrients. A green shoot grows towards the sun through the third eye. Once sprouted, an coconut palm grows fast and within five or six years will have matured into a graceful tree.

Coconut injury expert Professor Peter Barss of McGill University, who was presented with an Ig Nobel award at Harvard University last year for his paper "Injuries due to Falling Coconuts," reports that coconuts weigh up to 4 kilos [8.8lbs] and can easily fall 25 metres [80 feet] from the top of the tree. This gives them an impact speed of about 80 km/h [50mph], walloping humans with a force greater than a tonne.

Note for swimmers and divers:

"Coconuts kill around 150 people worldwide each year, which makes them about ten times more dangerous than sharks," says Brent Escott, managing director of Club Direct [Insurance]. "People may worry about being bitten by sharks when visiting Australia, but I would suggest that we would be better advised not to sit under coconut trees." Sharks are relatively docile. Worldwide, they attacked just 79 people in 2000, killing ten of them, three of whom were in Australia.