Vol. XII. No. 287, 



THE AQRICDLTURAL NEWS. 



HI 



STUDENTS' CORNER. 



MAY. 



First Period. 



Seasonal Notes. 



During this period niui;h attention will have to be devoted 

 to cultural operations in lime orchards. Pruning and -the 

 cutting out of dead wood must be done carefully 

 and the cut surfaces dealt with to prevent decay. Weed- 

 ing is sometimes done by means of the hoe and some- 

 times with the cutlass. Under what conditions is one 

 method likely to prove more beneficial than the other! The 

 forking of lime orchards, under certain conditions, is found to 

 prove beneficial, but this work must only be carried out under 

 close supervision. As was pointed out in the last series of 

 these notes, attention should be given to the lime nursery in 

 order to procure good healthy seedlings for planting out 

 when the time arrives for doing so. 



Most of the above remarks apply equally well to cacao 

 orchards. Canker of the stem can be well detected in the 

 showery weather of May and proper treatment should be 

 applied immediately. In planting out young cacao, care 

 should be taken to select plants which have been grown 

 from seeds produced by trees of known resistance to disease. 



The importance of good drainage has a direct bearing 

 \ipon the above remarks, and constitutes an essential point 

 in the editorial in the last issue of this journal, on The 

 Improvement of West Indian Pastures. The subject of 

 drainage is also dealt with in the article on Subsoil Water 

 published in this issue of the A<jricultural News. Figure 3 

 has been reproduced to illustrate the nature of the under- 

 ground water-supply in limestone soils in the West Indies, 

 and this diagram should be studied carefully in conjunction 

 with the article on subsoil water referred to above. 



C**>.L.aT MOIST 



C. CftPlLLil' WET L«(R 



TILE Df<>[l«3, 



Fn;. 3. DiAGR.\M Illusthatino the 



DlSTEIBUTIOX OK WaTER 



IN THE Soil. 



In proceeding to drain a field, one of the first things to 

 decide upon is the course of the main drain. This .should 

 run from the highest to the lowest point on moderately level 

 land. In other words, the outlet should theoretically be at 

 the lowest point in the field or area of orchard under treat- 

 ment e.ifcept, of course, in the case of liilly districts where 



main drainage along the line of greatest fall may result 

 in disastrous erosion. Although the outlet can some- 

 times be decided upon by ' inspection, the best results 

 are obtained by a system of levelling. A simple case is 

 as follows: The piece of land to be drained is divided 

 up into a number of imaginary squares, in chess board 

 fashion, and the level at each intersection is carefully taken. 

 The line which runs from the highest point to the lowest 

 marks the course of the main drain, and in a simple case 

 the gradation will be even from top to bottom. Iteference 

 must be made to text-books for details, but even without 

 knowledge of surveying, considerable value will attend close 

 observation of variations in levels, Ijoth as regards fields on 

 one and the same estate and on different estates, and efforts 

 should be made to correlate these results with any differences 

 in the crops situated in the locations under examination. 



Questions for Candidates. 



Preliminauy Questions. 



(1) What is capillarity and wherein lies its importance 

 in agriculture? 



(2) Show Ijy means of sketches the difference in the 

 appearance of the internal arrangement of the tissues in 

 a monocotyledon as compared with that in a dicotyledon. 

 Why is it impossible to graft plants of the former class! 



Intermediate Que.stions. 



(1) What manures have proved of greatest use in lime 

 cultivation! State the quantities applied per acre, and the 

 best time for the applications. Mention on what authority 

 you base your statements. 



(2) How would you proceed to find out the cost of 

 a pound of nitrogen and of potash (in an 'available' form)? 



Final Questions. 



(1) Write an essay (of about 500 words) on the 

 conditions governing labour contracts in the Colony in which 

 you live. Along what lines do you consider improvement 

 possible! 



(2) Relate any observations you have made on the 

 suitability of certain varieties of sugar-cane for the different 

 localities in any one island. Describe the system of experi- 

 ments that are conducted for the purpose of ascertaining 

 information on this question. 



The Verdict of the Animal.— In a paper which 



has been published in Science Prooress for January 1913, 

 concerning a discussion on animal nutrition at the last meet- 

 ing of the British Association at Dundee, it is observed that 

 an opportunity was afforded for physiologists, agricultural 

 chemists and practical feeders to indicate their own particular 

 point of view on the subject for the consideration of the 

 others. The discussion proved to be a remarkable success, 

 the result being the conclusion that entire reliance could not 

 be placed upon chemical analysis as an indication of the 

 nutritive value of any particular food stuff. Only experi- 

 ments with animals were believed to be final. An inter- 

 esting investigation was referred to which consisted in 

 a comparison of the feeding values of Egyptian cotton seed 

 cake with Bombay cotton seed cake. Although the Egyptian 

 nake had the higher value from the chemical point of view, an 

 extensive feeding experiment, sufficient to outrange the limits 

 of experimental error, showed that the cake of inferior com- 

 position produced the better results. 



