298 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[October i, 1884. 



PLANTING IN THE LO \V COUNTRY OF 



CKYLON. 



I From a Correspondent.) 



Henaratgoda, 3rd September 1884. 



Weather. — Here, as elsewhere, the raius of the S. W. 

 monsoon have failed, to the probable extent of two-thirds, 

 but July and August have been specially dry : from the 

 9th of the former to the 27th of the latter mouth 

 there were only four light showers, not more than one 

 inch altogether. On the 27th there was a shower, and 

 on the 2Sch there were several light geuial showers, every 

 drop of which the thirsty grouud drank greedily, and 

 there is now the promise of more. 



Liberian Coffee. — Ther.- was a promise of a tolerable 

 crop of coffee early in the season, but a fresh attack of 

 fungus and the recent drought together have taken off 

 a very heavy percentage. I now believe that even with- 

 out U. V. this product would never have been a good 

 investment. Even when on good soil it has escaped the 

 pest, and become a tree ten feet high and eight feet 

 wide, with a large mass of healthy foilage, I could put 

 its whole crop in my pocket. 



Oacao. — After a five years' battle, I am defeated along 

 my whole line. The legions of the winds have peppered 

 mi- in front, the demons of the soil have ruined my com- 

 missariat, while masked batteries have played on my 

 forces from all directions, and a disastrous retreat is all that 

 is left to me. The last charge routed me, horse.foot and artil- 

 lery. Whatever may be the source of the disease, it has been 

 most destructive here : while most of the feeble strugglers 

 have been blotted out, the finest and strongest have not 

 been spared. It is hard to believe that the mere punct- 

 ure made by an insect on the extremity of a twig will 

 be so poisonous as to carry gangrene into a strong branch, 

 and down that into the stem. Without denyiug the 

 agency of insects in helping on the disastrous state to 

 which the cacao trees are reuuoed, I only give it a place 

 among many causes. If planted where wiud can reach it, 

 either directly or otherwise, the death of the plant will 

 take place sooner or later according to the quality of 

 the soil ; if planted on indifferent soil, but well sheltered, 

 it will struggle long and die at last. A long spell of 

 cither wet or dry weather is equally bad for it ; insects 

 of sorts attack it in every stage of its existence, and it is, in 

 truth, the most delicate of all cultivated plants, though 

 one of the most profitable to grow where all the 

 conditi ins of success are present or can be produced 

 al a moderate cost, but where auy of the conditions are 

 wanting, better let its cultivation alone. 



Tea.— The tea planted here last year has had a bad time. 

 It had hardly made a start when the dry season of four 

 mouths came ou it, and again within the year it has to 

 st:ii). 1 another spell of tv o months' drought. It is very 

 unequal, but on the whole it looks healthy, and will no 

 doubt get on rapidly, now that we have rain. This year's 

 planting has not been in luck: the spells of rainy weather 

 have been so short and the intervening sunshine so long 

 thai limy have been having rather a bud time, and a corre- 

 sponding proportion have succumbed ; but the tea plant dies 

 hard, and many more of them are alive than could have 

 been reasonably hoped for. The plant, however, that has 

 been hardly used by the weather before getting a firm 

 hold of the soil resents its treatment, by hauging back 

 in its subsequent growth. The perfection of planting 

 weather is no sun and frequent light showers for a week 

 after planting, and we have had no such weather either 

 this or last season. On the 27th ultimo we had rain ; we 

 had more on the 28th, and on the 29th it rained for 3 hours 

 in the middle of the day. I knew all the risk, but the 

 temptation was irresistible, and I put out o,0U0 plants in 

 in the afternoon. It rained a good deal in the night, and 

 the 30th was a wet morning, so I put out another 5,000. 

 On the 31st there was much sun and little or no rain, 

 and when the morning of the 1st September rose bright, I 

 was in a very despondent mood, but it rained heavily before 

 two hours were over, and copious showers have been fall- 

 ing at intervals ever since, so that this last batch has 

 been as fortunate as any other put cut this season. Many 

 failures there be, no doubt ; that is however an instit- 

 ution in this climate, and, if we wait for very good planting 

 weather, we will not plant at all. 



Peppee. — I have only half-a-dozen pepper vines in fruit; 

 but the crop of these is so encouraging, that I have been 

 endeavouring to attach a vine to every standing iree, but 

 the deficiency of moisture has rendered my success of 

 the smallest, not five per cent having lived through the last 

 two dry months, and I have the work to go over again. 

 It may be noted that nearly all the vines planted close to 

 jak trees have lived, and nearly all those planted by other 

 trees are dead. The training on rocks is not ou the 

 whole satisfactory, but they do become attached, after 

 many failures, in proper aspects, and ou perpendicular 

 faces ; they utterly refuse to grow ou sloping faces. 



Imbul (Tree Cotton).— I sowed about a thousand imbuls 

 at stake, but the long drought has been too much for 

 them, and the few survivors look very seedy. Those 

 planted last October begin to be a feature ou the place, the 

 most forward being ten feet high. There is no tree that 

 sooner becomes large enough to train a pepper vine on, but 

 whether it is otherwise suitable for this purpose remains to 

 be tried. 



Cardamoms. — It appears that cardamoms are not likely 

 to make our fortunes in this part of the country. The 

 planting done last October grew well for a time, and lived 

 hrough the dry seasou, but one-half died when the first 

 ain came, and the survivors have grow i little since, and 

 his season's plantiug (seedlings) nearly all died. I suppose 

 the soil and climate are not suitable and thatthe shade is 

 not deuse enough. 



Ceara Kurber.— The Ceari rubber may be put out of 

 court now, I think. I cannot by anv meaus get enough of 

 produce to cover the cost of collection, and. so far as I can 

 learn, other people are iu the same case. Tea must now 

 take the place of that and all our other failures. 



"KAPOK" AND MUDAK FLOSS. 



In addition to the large amount of information 

 we have already given regarding the short-stapled 

 cotton which is kuown in Java and the countries to 

 which Java has so largely exported it as ' kapok,' 

 j we now give a translation of A'an Gorkom's article 

 in his work ou Netherlands India agriculture. 

 There are several reasons why the cotton tree is so 

 common in Java. It is used as supports for pepper 

 vines, but beyond all the cause of its great increase 

 was the use of po»ts and trees for the electric tele- 

 graph wheu first introduced. Iron posts are being 

 gradually supplied, but the kapok trees (every 

 post having gruwu into a tree) remain and yield 

 crops of the fljssy substance eo well suited for the 

 stuffing of mattresses aud pillows. Weaie surprized, 

 that, in his description of the tree, Van Gorkom 

 failed to notice what is a marked peculiarity of its 

 mode of growth : not only are the branches thrown 

 out in horizontal tiers, but it is the rarest possible 

 occurrence to have ei her fewer or more than three 

 branches in each tier. 



We give also a translation of the Dutch writer's 

 notice of mudar (Calntropis gigantca) and we add an 

 extract from the Treasury of Botany. But cert- 

 ainly it is news to us that a bush of the 

 nutdar plant will yield more floss than a cotton- 

 tree. Whatever may be the case in Java, we do not 

 think it is so in Ceylon. The plant is common 

 and widely-distributed in India and Ceylon. In 

 the North-Western Provinces of India the mudar 

 abounds on poor undulating lands where it seems 

 specially to flourish. It is quite a feature in the landscape 

 around Muttra and Agra, and, if anywhere, it ought 

 to be there utilized for the floss aud stem fibres. As far 

 as Ceylon is concerned we have more hope in the 

 fibre than iu the floss, but for this as for all fibrous 

 plants a good machine is wanted, such as has not yet 

 appeared. 



