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THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[December i, 1S82. 



developing of flower-buds, aud its wood-formation re- 

 ceives a check from the dry wenther — as later wheu it has 

 to collect all its forces for the maturing of fruit. Unless 

 I am much mistaken, most of our English orchard trees 

 put forth their flowers before a single leaf is formed ! 



Then ' VV ' opines that in 1876 the fungus attained 

 its utmost force. He seems so positive of this that 

 I dare not contradict it. Nevertheless I fear that 

 just now we have on usaixulmoster attack than that was. 



It is not so long since the ravages of the pest 

 paid us two distinct visits in the year ; now we have 

 hemikia, like the poor, always with us. I have allowed 

 this letter to run to too great a length, and will 

 now bring it to a conclusion. I am persuaded that 

 leaf-disease is the prime cause of our present misery, 

 and that its ravages would have been a mere trifle 

 to what they have been, but for wind, which in its 

 turn would have affected us but little, had more 

 prudence been exercised in the clearing of forest land ; 

 that grub has slain its thousands of trees, but that 

 •wiih carelessness in selecting plants, smA a host of other 

 causes which have been adduced, have moved merely 

 as satellites to Hemileia Vastatrix. — Faithfully yours, 



P. T. L. 



WHAT AILS' OUR COFFEE :— STARVATION ? 



Sir, — "W." in his letters, tried to show us, "what 

 ails our coflfee"' he has shown us it is not leaf-diseaae 

 and has not shown us anything more. Starvation is 

 what ails our coffee ; either Ist no manure, 2nd man- 

 ure mis-applied, or 3rd insufficiency of manure. 1st 

 perhaps it will be asked, how did coffee bear in 

 former years without manure ? In former years cof- 

 fee got well manured with decayed weeds, in proof of 

 which, I will give two instances. 1st : — Palamcotta 

 estate in Bakwana, belonged to a Colombo merchant ; 

 it was very weedj-, then the merchant failed and 

 nothing "as done to the estate for soiue months, it 

 was bought by Messrs. C. Shand & Co. and immedi- 

 ately sold to Messrs. Mitchell & Rust, when they 

 got the place the coffee could not be seen for the 

 weeds, and yet that place gave 15 cwt. an acre after 

 that for 3 years running. Next was Oonagalla estate 

 in Kornegalle, said to be 120 acres in extent but, what 

 with slab rock, etc., I do not believe there was 80 

 acres of coffee. It was allowed to get into such a 

 mess that coolies had to be put on with catties 

 to cut down the jungle stuff' before any weeding 

 could be done, and yet that place gave 3,000 

 bushels of parchment for some years after. About 

 1864 an idea was started that we could not grow weeds 

 and coffee ; it sounded very well in theory, but I think 

 proved a failure in practice and there is no doubt 

 that the sun takes more goodness out of the soil, 

 than the weeds did. -!nd. — Like in weeding a new 

 fashion has been started in manuring, and that is 

 sowing it broadcast, and then forking it in ; to fork 

 it in thoroughly it would require more than one 

 forking, which is seldom done ; the consequence is, 

 that a portion of the manure is washed away, aud 

 the question is, do the roots of the coffee get at 

 the remaining manure to be of any benefit. I doubt 

 if the coffee dei-ives much more benefit from it, than 

 what a mere forking would have done. If crops 

 are expected from manure, the manure must be placed 

 where the roots can get at it. 



3rd. Insufficiency of manure. Baron Liebig said, 

 " that a coffee tree would take up I lb of bocu duts 

 to produce a crop," but when it had taken up the 

 1 lb of bone dust, what has a tree to go on with, to 

 mature that crop and carry it on to the next? Is 

 it any wonder then that if a tree takes up what 

 little manure that has been applied, it is unable to 

 bring its crop to maturity and is left more dcid than 

 alire. Much has been written against coffee of late, | 



but, it must be remembered that we have had in- 

 stances of individual trees under peculiar circum- 

 stances bearing at tlie rate from 5 to 30 tons an 

 acre, and with proper cultivation there is no 

 doubt that coffee can be made to bear as much 

 as it ever did before. I do not say that with 

 proper cultivation there may not be occasional failures 

 of crops. Over those circumstances man has no con- 

 trol, and coffee is not the only product that suffers 

 from those cii'cumstances. What I say is this, that 

 with proper cultivation coffee is the most profitable 

 product that can be grown in Ceylon. — I remain, yours 

 truly, G. F. HALLILEY. 



[By "proper cultivation" we take Mr. Halliley to 

 mean liberal manuring and little, if any, weeding. 

 Wliere are trees to be found bearing at the rate of 

 30 tons an acre? — Ed.] 



COFFEE LEAF-DISEASE DUE TO VITIATED 

 SAP? 



Dear Sir, — Trees (exogenous) of which our coffee 

 is one, never die a natural death; tbey die from accid- 

 ent or disease: either the roots go down into an un- 

 suitable strata, or all the available food within 

 their reach has been exhausted, or the roots get 

 so matted vhat they prevent the sap flowing up into 

 the tree, or some disease sets in ; so that, if a tree got 

 sufficient food and moisture and met with no accident, 

 it would go on growing and bearing for ever. If a 

 tree takes up too much moisture without sufficient 

 essential food, as soon as a little bright, sunny weather 

 sets in, the sap gets disoraauized and mildew or some 

 other disease sets in. Before a coffee tree gets an 

 attack of leaf-disease, the edges of the leaves turn a dirty 

 yellowish white and the wider it becomes the worse 

 that tree is attacked with leaf-disease, so that there 

 cannot be any doubt but that the sap is first disorgan- 

 ized and it afterwarcis contracts the disease through 

 someaction of the atmosphere on the leaves; or how are we 

 to account for patches away from any dieease suddenly 

 getting affected ? There have been trees free from disease 

 though surrounded with affected trees. It is a pity 

 the observers did not examine, the condition of their 

 positions. I have no doubt that they would have 

 found that they were growing in better soil than 

 their neighbours. As they were not trees not liable to 

 be affected, their seed planted elsewhere get diseased. 

 Another proof that leaf-disease is owing to the dis- 

 organization of the sap is what first drew our atten. 

 tion to the disease and that was that oar fruit was 

 attacked, in the large number of black beans, iu the 

 crop of 1870-71. So that the only cure for leaf-disease 

 is proper manure, properly applied, and then proper 

 treatment of the trees and we would get proper crops ; 

 without this, we can no more make coffee pay than a 

 Loudon maiket gardener could make his garden pay, 

 if he did not cultivate it properly.— Yours truly, 



G. F. HALLILEY. 



P.S. — There used to be a tree on " Baharundrah " 

 estate in Kotnialie that used to give its 5 and 6 

 bushels of cherry. G. F. H. 



THE TEA-PLANTING ENTERPRIZE IN CEYLON. 



November 6th, 1882. 



Dear Sir, — Let us take "D. W. F. L."'s first para- 

 graph in which he considers " Cha" 's estimate of yield 

 per acre of tea as " liberal and reckless. ' Tea planters 

 in Ceylon have not, ae a rule, been anxioue to pub- 

 lish their annual yield yei- acre, but, if we may take 

 as our standrtrd the statement published in the 

 Observer by Messrs. Mackwood & Co., namely that 

 the yield at Gallebodde estaie for the jear ending 

 June 30th 1882 (when the tea was four years old) 

 was 530 lb. per acre it does not strike one that 



