-jio 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[March i, 1883. 



NEW INDUSTRIES. 



{To the Editor " Tro2>ical Aijiicnltmist.") 

 SiP,_— To those who may be atti'acted to the 

 cultivation of sun flowers, after readiug the various 

 uses to which the plant can be applied (as stated in 

 your ccilumns), I would strongly recommend bee-hep- 

 tng also, as I have noticed all kinds of bees sucking 

 away at sunflowers like mad (to use a homnly expres- 

 sion) ; and any one posse^sinn a few acres of ordinary 

 land cannot do better than supplement his income by 

 this pleasant and profitable occupation. Certainly I 

 know of no pursuit that can be done cheaper.— Youvs, 



A. 



THE BENEFIT OF WEEDS AND SOOT : A CURE 

 FOR MILDEW. 



Deak Sir,— "Swaddy" writes of Gallaha of ISl-i-'JQ 

 when it was fr<im 260 to over .300 acres in coffee, 

 whereas I wrote of it of previous to 1858, when it 

 was only 160 acres in extent and before the chunam 

 fields were known. If you refer to Chamber's " In- 

 formation for the People," vol. i., p. 497, and read 

 how peat is formed, and then read p. 65 as to how soil 

 is increased through plants from the atmosphere, and 

 then look at any cutting on a patana, and see how 

 even |rass has formed soil on what at one time 

 m\i8t have been a bed of quartz or gravel, I think 

 even you will be convinced that a carpet of weeds 

 will not only conserve the soil, but will increase it, 

 and if you look at p. 574, you will see the cause of 

 disease and death in trees. 



Have any of your readers tried the mixture I re- 

 commended ? If you look at mildew in Beeton's 

 " Dictionary of Daily Wants," you will see that soot is 

 a cure for mildew in agriculture, and " Loudon " says, 

 " the best means to prevent its appearance seems to 

 be keeping the plants in a state of vigorous growth, 

 as it is found only on such plants as do not appear 

 to have Bufiicient strength to resist its attacks." — 

 Yours truly, G. F. HALLILEY. 



[We have the most entire belief in the formation 

 and conservation of soil by plants, say weeds, but 

 we do not believe in weeds and cultivated plants 

 growing together. — Ed. C. O.] 



BARK INSTEAD OF HOPS: WHf NOT 

 TRY IN CEYLON? 



.January 31st, 1883. 



Dear Sir.— The enclosed cutting is from the Field 

 in re the hop famine and substitutes for the eame, but 

 I do not see cinchona Iwrk directly mentioned. Now 

 the price of bark has fallen, why do nut the Nuwara 

 Eliya brewery use the bark instead of hops ? It it 

 can be used advantageously as a substitute for hops, 

 surely Ceylon is the place to prove it, and by prov- 

 ing this the Nuwara Eliya Brewery would not only 

 save themselves from considerable expense in the manu- 

 facture of these beer, but would, at the same time, 

 confer a benefit on the colony by opening up a market 

 for what promises to be our most important product 

 for the future. ' ..r.r,^v,oT 



A COLONIST. 



BLIGHT IN NURSERIES OR SEEDBBUS. 

 February 3rd, 1883. 

 Dear Sie,— In answer to your querist " Blight," in 

 your issae of the 1st instant, let me recommend him^ to 

 try watering the seedbeds with lime water, having first 

 pulled out all the seedlings round the diseased spots. 

 As yet I have found this blight only in beds which 

 were too damp, too dark, and too thickly sown. 



The thinner sown that seedbeds are and the more 

 lichl they obtain the better.— Yours truly, 

 ^ ^ QUIKQUINA. 



AGRICULTURE IN INDIA. 



[To the ESlyrof the •' Times of India.") 

 Sir, — I have read with interest the account, written 

 by the Official Director of the Department of Agricul- 

 ture and Commerce, N.-W. P. and Oudh, of the various 

 experiments which he has made. There are some of 

 which he records the results, that might have been 

 taken for granted, from the general applicability of the 

 old maxim that the more you work land the better you 

 make it. Winter ploughing at home is considered 

 much more valuable than spring ploughing, and winter 

 manuring the best. Chemically speaking, the soil and 

 manure get oxidised and disintegrated, and therefore 

 more ready to take part in those cliemical operations 

 which result in the growth of plants. This is the 

 result of his experiment when he has inverted the soil 

 two months prior to sowing. I notice his inversion is 

 limited to six inches : bis is a safe depth, but let him 

 beware of following up his advantage too e;igerly Many 

 a farmer has been ruined by falling in love with deep 

 ploughing ; he has raised his subsoil to the surface of 

 thf soil, and put himself in the position of the reclaimer 

 of wa^ie land, and the whde he was paying rental for 

 the belt arable. Another ol I and time-honoured maxim 

 is, " Don't work your land (while) wet." When you 

 do so, you can easily understand that you are more 

 likely to produce bricks than pulverised soil, and the 

 return will correspond to the crops that could be ex- 

 pected off these varieties of soil. The one great element 

 that is wanting in Indian soils, and which is not sup- 

 plied to them by manure as applied by natives, is 

 nitrogen. Odours are to some degree nutrient, and in 

 India where everything smells but the flowers, the 

 deficient nitrogen of this soil may be supplied by 'he 

 atmosphere. But here we have another example of 

 misrule by the English in India : they are actually by 

 sanitary measures impoverishing the air, and have not 

 been .able to induce the population to correspondingly 

 enrich the soil. 



T. HUME. 



CASTOR SEEDS. 



{To tJie Editor of the "Indian Agriculturist.") 

 Sir,— In your issue of November 1, " H. T. T." 

 writing from the Berars, mentions a large white variety 

 of castor plant, which grows to a height of 15 or 20 

 feet, and lasts for several years. This variety is un- 

 known to us down here, and I should be much obliged 

 if " H. r. T." would kindly put me in the way of 

 gettiuga small packet of seeds down to experiment with. 

 Kurnool, Madras. 



iJoTE. — We h.ive obtained and forwarded a packet of 

 seeds to our correspondent. — Ed. /, A. 



The Offiwal Estimate of the Jiiva Coffee crop 

 this year was reduced on the 30th November to 

 1,041,925 piculs. At that date the quantit}' deli\'ered 

 at the Government storehouse amounted to 1,022,598 

 piculs. — Batavia Darjhlad, 10th Dec, in Straits Times. 



Oheert-Deied Coffee. — As to coffee curing, and Mr. 

 Morris' remarks thereou, in which he stated that were 

 coffee dried in the husk like Mocha and not washed, it 

 would realise higher prices in the home market, Ex- 

 perience gained in Ceylon points to the contrary, though 

 we are aware of the finer flavor of coffee, so prepared, 

 over the ordinary washed coffee, if well matured on the 

 tree. On the other hand, it may be asked — why does 

 the ordinary Brazil coffee take such a poor positiou in 

 the coffee market when it is gathered and dried as it 

 comes from the trees, the washed description command- 

 ing a higher figiu-e ? AVe remember a parcel of fine high- 

 grown estate coffee dried in the husk, being shipped to 

 England and there sold at the price of native coffee with 

 wliich it was ranked. "We are sure that Mr. Morris will 

 fiud the cherry dried system not a success.— '-Oeylon Tiuios. 



