52 



THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 



June 7, 1902. 



extension of the lime industry in nominica, an cxiierinient 

 plot of limes Wiis started under the direction of the Hou'lile 

 Francis Watts at Han)i)Ste;ul estate. The ]ilot is divided 

 into nine sections, and experiments arc lieing conducted 

 with the object of ascertaining the effect of various kinds of 

 manurial snlistances on the lime cultivation. 



CULTIVATION OF PARA RUBBER. 



A brief' nccount of the coiiditionis undo)- which 

 trees yielding Pai-a rubber flourish in theii- native 

 country was piiblished in the Aiji-'icultu ral News 

 (pp. 3()-87). It is desirable to add to that account a 

 few additional liicts that have ri.'cently been jilaccd on 

 recoid. 



It was lornierly th<night that the Para rubber 

 tree (Hvvvn hrd.silicnHis) could only thrive in swampy 

 land, or at any rate on land subjected to ]icriodieai 

 inundations. This (piestion was discussed by Mr. J. H. 

 Hart in bis ])apei- on 'Rubber ))lanting in the West 

 Indies' at the Agricultural Conference of liH)l ( Wr.^l 

 J,i'll<in Biilldin, Vol.11., p. 104.). Mr. Hart ])ointcd 

 out that in Ceylon it has been found that the 

 trees do best in good alluvial soil on fairly flat land, 

 at about sea-level, and that in Trinidad they aif 

 'even gj'owing on a dry gravelly soil.' I'hc manner in 

 which the erroneous idea about their re(|uiriiig swam])y 

 land came to be circulated is explained in a iicont 

 articlt! by Mr. H. A. Wickham, who in LSTti 7 seived as 

 a special commissionei- and collected foi- the Indian 

 (lovernment .some 7,000 plants from which the wholi' 

 of th«' |r<'seiit stock of I'ara I'ubbei' phints in the East 

 have pi-obably been raised. 'I'Jir following extract is 

 taken fi-mn Tin'. /iiilid-Kuhht'r a ml tl aiin-Pci-fhit 

 Trndi's JiHi riKil foi- .larmaiy 20, WHVl. 



' As all the stock of jilants oi- seed availalije for the 

 jilantingand cultivation of this tree in the Eastern tropics are 

 ami will l)e derived fidm direct lineal dcsceii<lants of some oi- 

 other of those 7,000 odd originall}- introduced by me at the 

 instance of the (ioverinntnt of India in IS76-7, it may he 

 well if it lie recollected that their exact jilace ofoiigin was 

 in three degrees of .soulli latitude, and to remendici' tlieir 

 natural conditions there. This, the more so, since a very 

 general error seem.s to liave obtained that swampy or wet 

 lands are tlie fitting locality for the U>'(ii. This would seem 

 to have arisen in that the " explorer'' of a few years' cx]ieii 

 ence would have some of these tree.s jiointed out to him 

 (naturally in answer to ini|uiries) growi)ig scattered along the 

 wet margins in going \\\\ the lower .Vinazon or tributaries, 

 whereas the true forests of the Fara rubber tree lie 

 back on the highlands, and those conunonly seen by the 

 in(|uiring traveller are but ill grown tiecs which have sprung 

 u|i from seeds brought down by fre.shets frnni the interior. 



' As a matter of fact, the uliole of the lln'ia which I 

 procured for the (jovernnient of India were produced on large 

 grown trees in the forest covering the broad Jilateaux dividing 

 the Ta]iajos from the Madeira rivers. The soil of these well 

 ilraincd, wide extending, forest-covered table lan<ls is a stiff 

 .soil not remai-kably rich, but deep and uniform in character. 

 The lli'iva found growing in these unbroken forests rival all 

 but the largest of the trees therein, attaining to a I'ircum- 

 ference of 10 feet to 12 feet in the bole. These forest plains 

 having all the character of widespread table lands occupy the 



space betwixt the great arterial livcr systems of the Amazon, 

 and pi-esent an escarped face, which follow.s, at greater or 

 l(^ss distance, and abuts steeply on, the igapo or vaga-s, — i.e., 

 the marginal river jdains — .subject to inundation by the 

 ainmal rise of the great riyer. So thorough is the drainage 

 of this highland that the people who anmially jienctrate into 

 these forests for the seas( n's working of the rubber have to 

 utilize certain lianas (water-bearing vine-s) for their water 

 sup])ly, since none is to be obtained by surface well sinking, 

 in s]iite ot the heavy rainfall during great part of the jear.' 



In Burma an experiment is in cour.se of progies.s, 

 under the superintf^ndence of Major J. A. Wyllie, I.S.C, 

 F.R.G.S., to determine the possibility of growing Para 

 rubber on a sewage farm. The I nd in ii Rahhcr Warhl 

 for A])ril 1, 1002 says:— 



' The nnuiicipal duties of Major Wyllie comprise (among 

 other things) the management of pufjlie gardens and the 

 di.spo.sal of jiublic refuse in Rangoon. In the.se gardens for 

 several year.s past .Major AVyllie has been carrying out 

 experiments in rubber growing, one result of which, at the 

 close of 1S98, was a stock of Para and Ceara rubber seedlings 

 out of pniportion to the sjiace available in the garden.s. At 

 the same time, objection had been made to the disjio.sal of 

 .sewage in a region devoted to market gardening, whereupon 

 Major Wyllie secured 'M acres of ground convenient to 

 IJangoon, which was laid out as a sewage farm, and to which 

 the rubber seedlings were transplanted. " The young Heveas 

 seem cajiable of absorbing any amount of maniuo and the 

 farm itself is of great use in the opportunities it gives of 

 observing the behaviour and recpiirements of the Para rubl)er 

 tree during the period of acclimatization." 



' On the whole,' write.s Major Wyllie, after detailing 

 the experimental woi'k done on his rubber sewage farm, ' the 

 cultiue of rubber in Hnrma may lie looked upon, if not .us the 

 coining industry, at least as one of the industries bound 

 to come. It may be objected that, if such minute atten- 

 tion to detail is recpiired for the establislnncnt of a rub- 

 ber forest, rubber cannot be the wonderfully pmlitable 

 cro)) it has been assei-ted to be. Hut this is a mistake. The 

 more carefully minor points are observed and results noted 

 in the first beginnings of the undertaking, the sooner will the 

 needful lessons be learneil, and Icained <ince fur all ' 



The sewage farm is known as t'le Kaiube planta- 

 tion. It comprised, on ,luly 10, i!)01, the following 

 mnid)cr of iiibbei- plants, besides which a large mimber 

 of seeds had lately been jdaced in the ground: Para, 

 2.7:52 : Coara, 2!):i : other .sjjecies (12 : total, :J,0.S7. 



'i'hc aiticle 1ms two illustrations showing the 

 entrance to the Indian lubber and Sewage farm, and a 

 jiortion })lanted out with Para rubber seeillings. 



Precocious Germination in a Melon. The g.rmi- 



nation of .seeds while still attached to the parent plant (its 

 is th(! case in some of the n;angroves) is not common in the 

 plant world. \n interesting ca.se of precocious germination 

 in melons is described Viy Sir W. T. Thistleton-Dyer, in the 

 Annals of Botdny for March 1902. A melon on being 

 cut open was found to cont.iin a large number of s;xdling 

 melons which ha<I dcvclopc<l from the seeds and grown at 

 the expense of the sugary juice of the fruit. Some of them 

 weighed twenty times mon^ than the seeds from which they 

 grew. Examiilessuch as this are of considerable scientific 

 interest, and it is hoped that an aecoinit of any such axsen 

 met with in the West Imlies will be contributi'd to the.se 

 coliuuns. 



