)86 



THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 



Jfne 8, 1912. 



It is shown in the Uganda Official Gazette for March 31, 

 1912, that the amount of ginned cotton exported from the 

 Protectorate during the nine months ending December 31, 

 1911, was 4,798,192 ft., value £142,622; in the same way 

 the quantity of unginned cotton exported was 2,944,816 ft., 

 value £29,945, and of cotton seed 4,960,480 ft., value 

 £4,462. The .similar figures for the .same period of 1910 

 were: ginned cotton, 2,302,384 ft., value £75,3-56; unginned 

 cotton 3,150,112 ft., value £24,896; and cotton seed 

 2,364,656 ft., value £2,102. 



GLEANINGS. 



It is stated in the Louitiana Planter iox April 27, 1912, 

 that the sugar production in Brazil for the season 1911-12 is 

 estimated at 270,000 tons. Of this amount 210,000 tons will 

 be employed for home consumption. 



According to The Board of Trade Journal for Febru- 

 ary 29, 1912, the exports of cacao from Para, Itacoatiara 

 and Manaos, by way of Para, during the year 1911, amounted 

 to 5,871,800 ft. In the previous year the corresponding 

 export was 8,122,400 ft., and in 1909 10,628,200 ft. 



Writing from Matamoras (Mexico) the United States 

 Consul there says that the region is rapidly becoming 

 a cotton-growing country. In 1910 there were raised 600 

 bales, and last year 2,000 bales while there will probably be 

 a crop of over 3,000 bales in 1912. There has been plenty 

 of rain for the new season, and up to March 6 about 25 per 

 cent, of the acreage has been planted. (The Textile Mer- 

 cury, April 13, 1912.) 



Der Tro2jen2}Jlanzer ioT April 1912, p. 208, contains an 

 abstract of an account of work carried out with Manihot 

 Glaziocii in German East Africa, in which the results of the 

 investigation permit it to be gathered that the branches of 

 this tree contain quite 12'1 per cent, more rubber than the 

 corresponding parts of a stem belonging to a tree which has 

 branched high up, but that the cost of tapping is at least 

 30 per cent, greater. It is further admitted that no more 

 favourable lesults are produced in cases where more branch- 

 ing exists than is found in the average tree. 



At a meeting of the committee of the Lawes Agricul- 

 tural Trust held ou March 30, Mr. A. D. Hall, F.E.S., 

 Director of the Kothamsted Experiment Station, tendered 

 his resignation. Mr. Hall's resignation takes effect in Sep- 

 tember, after which he will give his whole time to the work 

 of the Development Commission. The committee of the 

 Lawes Agricultural Trust will proceed to the election of 

 a new director in June. {Nature, April 11, 1912.) 



A note is presented in the Experiment Station Record 

 Vol. XXVI, No. 3 (issued March 20, 1912), stating that 

 particular attention should be given to the proper sampling 

 of mixtures containing copper salts, meant for spraying, 

 when it is intended to subject them to analysis. The reason 

 is that the most valuable portion, consisting of the copper 

 salts, is likely to settle to the bottom of the sack during 

 transportation; this was proved by analyses of mixtures taken 

 at different levels of the material in a sack. 



Statistics of the customs of Haut-Senegal et Niger show 

 that an increasing export is being made of the nuts of the 

 palm Borassus Jiaheliifer, var. Aethiopium. The use of these 

 is mainly as a substitute for the vegetable ivory obtained 

 from the fruits of PhytcleplMi macroiarpa, a palm growing 

 chiefly in the Andes of Colomljia, Ecuador and Peru. An 

 illustrated description of this palm was given in the Agricul- 

 tt'ro.l Neivg, Vol. VII, p. 58. 



In the Bulletin Agricole of Mauritius for March 1912 

 attention is drawn to the fact that the United States Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture has just published the conclusions of its 

 investigations relating to the presence of phosphoric acid in 

 leaves of different plants, at different stages of their growth. 

 The general result of these investigations is that the phos- 

 phoric acid content of leaves is found to be at its greatest 

 proportion at the time when vegetative growth is at the 

 highest, and that gradual diminution fellows. It may be 

 added that the fact of the withdrawal of food substances 

 from leaves, previous to their falling, is well known. 



Information has been received from the Department of 

 Agriculture, Commerce aind Labour, Cuba, to the effect that 

 certain dependencies of this department have in the past 

 employed in their calculations the Spanish ton of 2,000 ft. 

 for sugar- cane and the English ton of 2,240 ft. for sugar. 

 As, however, the first of the units is not suited for practical 

 commercial purposes, it has been decided that the cane ton 

 in future calculations shall be that cf 100 arrobas, or 2,500 ft., 

 while the sugar ton will remain at 2,240 ft., that is the 

 English ton, in accordance with the usage of the principal 

 markets of the world. These facts will facilitate calculations 

 in which figures^ eminating from that department are em- 

 ployed. 



The Gardeiiers' Chronicle for April 20, 101 J. states that 

 the researches of Professor Bottomley have sho.vn that the 

 roots of the sw-oet gale or bog myrtle (Myrica Gale), a plant 

 occurring frequently in Great Britain, in mountain bogs, 

 possess root nodules which are inhabited by Pseudomonas 

 radieicola, the organism which is responsible for the forma- 

 tion of similar nodules on the roots of leguminous plants. 

 Thus it has been shown that this, although it is not a pod- 

 bearing plant, must rank with the Leguminosae as a nitro- 

 gen-Hxlng plant.. In the experiments, the interesting observ- 

 ation was made, that plants of the bog myrtle possessing 

 nodules wer^ able to -thrive in soil containing no combined 

 nitrogen, while those which did not show the nodules were 

 unable to live under the conditions. 



