THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[July i, 1884' 



between them, cover the beds with straw or grass, and 

 water, when there is four or five days without rain. 



Lining. — The olearing should be completed by the end of 

 February , and the lining and holing begun with the first 

 March rains. Experience has settled 25 by 25 feet as the 

 proper distance. Great care should be taken in lining, not 

 that a foot or two one way or another will affect the 

 ultimate crops, but no one with good taste can wish to 

 leave behind him a lasting memorial of careless work, 

 when a little more trouble will record his skill for a century. 

 Holing. — Ooconut holes cannot be made too large, say 

 3 by 3 by 3 feet, and they should be filled iu for half 

 their depth, with soil from the surrounding surface. It 

 is important to give the plant the means of a fair start, 

 and 18 inches of loose rich soil, below and all round it, is 

 the best available means to that end ; indeed a plant so 

 reated, will gain several years on one placed in a one- 

 foot hole. 



Fencing. — The next operation, or rather an earlier one, 

 is a fence sufficient to keep out cattle. There is generally 

 enough of wood on the ground to form a strong rough 

 fence that will serve the purpose for three years, and the 

 planting of a live-fence may be deferred till that be- 

 gins to fail or till there is leisure to attend to it. 

 There are many plants that may be used for fencing, 

 but that in most common use is erandu, the effici- 

 ency of which depends entirely on the maintainance 

 of cross-sticks tied to each plant, and that requires to 

 be renewed, at considerable expense, at least once a 

 year. Sapan is straggling and unreliable, and is given 

 to resentment when any attempt is made to train it. 

 The Bide-a-wee thorn would make an excellent fence, 

 but I am not aware, that it has ever been tried, 

 or even that it will submit to training, more than to ex- 

 ternal meddling. The kaju makes a very effective fence, 

 in the Kadirana cinnamon estates, but, like all other live- 

 fences, it needs training and labour to keep it in order. 

 The fact is that plants in great variety may be trained 

 into a good fence, but all require labour and care. 



Secondary Crops and Goyas. — I have no objections to 

 growing secondary crops ou a young coconut field ; but the 

 value of the crops should cover the cost of labour at 

 current rates, restore (in the shape of manure) the fertility 

 they take out of the land, and yield the owner some re- 

 turn of profit for his time and trouble. Those conditions 

 are not met by the usual goya course — kurakkan, cassava 

 and sweet potatoes. These products have only a local 

 value, and are only used by the poorest of a poor popul- 

 ation. The kurakkan crop is the most exhausting that 

 can betaken off land, consuming more of the nitrates and 

 phosphates than many other products of much greater 

 value would do ; and if cassava and sweet potatoes are less 

 detrimental to the soil, their money-value is hardly worth 

 cultivating. By the employment of goyas, the land-owner 

 saves the payment for felling and clearing his land, under 

 KIO per acre on the average ; he receives a few rupees 

 per acre as the land-share of the crops, and he need be 

 nothing out on account of cultivation for the first two 

 years, and all that he gets will seldom aggregate R30 per 

 acre. Per contra, he loses an unknown measure of the 

 freshness and fertility of his soil, which, because it is un- 

 known, he never counts ; yet it is a real element in the 

 account. Were I interested in the question, I would sub- 

 mit a sample of kurakkan to a chemist and thus ascertain 

 the money-value of the elements it removes, but, as I 

 am not, and never intend to be, I am not prepared to 

 go to the expense. I would be more tolerant of goya cult- 

 ivation, if they would grow some other crop than the 

 everlasting kurakkan. Dry chillies, for instance, are worth 

 R25 per cwt. and average jungle soil will certainly yield 

 3 cwt., most probably more, whereas the money-value of 

 the best kurakkan crop is usder E30 per acre. If the 

 proprietor starts his estate with capital enough to do his 

 cultivation full justice, there are many ways in which this 

 case be done with greater profit than employing goyas. 



Secondary Crops and Alternative Treatment. — As secondary 

 crops, such products as croton and anatto would be much 

 more profitable than goya culture ; the former sells at 

 70s to 80s in the London market, and I believe there is 

 always a paying market for the latter, thougli I found 

 no quotation in the T. A. In faot, there are many things 

 that could be grown with profit on the land, and with 



small injury to the coconuts, during the long years the 

 cultivator lias to wait ; and if some of the profit be ex- 

 pended iu fertilizers for the secondary crops, the coconuts 

 will partake The only thing to be avoided in such case 

 is growing anything running up to shade the coconuts. 

 If it is preferred to devote the whole strength of the land 

 to the coconuts and bring them into early bearing by 

 forcing the best way is to sow the land with guinea-grass, 

 stall feed as many cattle as will eat it, and keep 

 putting the manure so made to the most feeble, and 

 lagging trees in the field. By this means the trees may 

 be brought into heavy bearing years earlier than they 

 would yield a nut if left unaided even by tetlieriug cattle 

 on the natural pasture, so that they cannot reach the 

 young trees ; and by digging in the droppings near theplants, 

 much may be done in hastening bearing. Such operations 

 would not, indeed, bring any fresh fertilizing matter into 

 the land, but, by concentrating such as was already there and 

 placing it within reach of the roots, the tree would be 

 strengthened and stimulated to push out roots more 

 rapidly in search of further supplies of plant-food, result- 

 ing iu quicker growth and earlier maturity. I would be 

 glad to convince every owner of a young coconut property 

 that it is more to his advantage to treat his trees gener- 

 ously and get them into bearing iu seven or eight years 

 than by grudging and withholding a very moderate annual 

 expenditure, having the trees straggling into bearing over 

 the whole ten years between the tenth and twentieth, 

 and that twenty acres fairly treated throughout will, at ten 

 years' time, be a more valuable property than one hundred 

 that has been starved and neglected. It has been sadly 

 against a progressive improvement in the cultivation of 

 coconuts that the proprietors are almost to a man traders, 

 clerks and professional men who have thus invested their 

 savings, but who acquire no knowledge of the habits and 

 requirements of the plant. 



Enemies of Coconuts : Wild figs. — If there are wild pigs 

 in the neighbourhood of newly-planted coconuts, they 

 are very destructive, and I know no effectual means of 

 circumventing them. A secure fence would do, but I have 

 never seen a sufficiently secure fence. Night-watching is 

 of little use in dark nights, while battue-hunting is not 

 easily organized, and is seldom if ever effectual iu either 

 exterminating or driving the herd away from the locality. 

 This danger is, however, passing away as the country is 

 opened, though the herds often linger in their old haunts 

 as long as they have cover. It is only within the first 

 six or eight months that the plants are liable to this evil. 

 White Ants. — White ants are very destructive to young 

 plants for the first year or till the roots have so far pene- 

 trated the soil that the plant is independent of the 

 nourishment derived from the husk. Many things have 

 been tried os remedies with more or less success, but the 

 only thing that effectually settles them is arsenic. The 

 difficulty is in the application of the minute quantity 

 necessary: half-an-ounce of arsenic would poison all the 

 termites in a hundred acres if they could be induced to 

 partake of it. From Queensland we are told that a paste 

 of flour, sugar and a small quantity of arsenic distributed 

 about their nests will clear a whole neighbourhood. No 

 doubt the smallest atom of the poison will suffice for a 

 single ant if it can be induced to take it. This inform- 

 ation was accompanied with a piece of natural history 

 that, if true, would render dealing with this pest extremely 

 simple. It is maintained that white ants eat the dead, 

 so that when you have succeeded in poisoning one, you 

 have provided for the destruction of a thousand. I would 

 recommend the following process in the case of coconut 

 plants :— Take a tub, fill it nearly full with fresh water, 

 dissolve in it a quarter of a pound of sugar to each gallon 

 of water, add Hour till the mixture is of the consistency 

 of whitewash, add two grains of arsenic for every gal- 

 lon of water. Mix thoroughly and keep stirring while the 

 coconuts are being dipped in the mixture. Lay the nuts 

 iu the sun to dry the thiu coating of the mixture that 

 adheres to their surface, and then plant. There is no 

 doubt whatever that the insects will be destroyed if they 

 eat the mixture, and it will be impossible for them to 

 reach the coconut without doing so. 



Cuttle. — Cattle eat the leaves of young coconuts, and 

 for the first three years must be absolutely excluded, in- 

 securely tethered, out of reach of the plants, 'i 'hi y ire 

 out of danger when the animal can no longer reach tli 



