January i, 1885.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST., 



5°9 



®otiti3sp0ncUmi30. 



♦ 



To the Editor of the "Ceylon Observer" 

 TEA JAT AND THE QUESTION OF HYBRIDS. 

 Assam, 1st Nov. 1884. 



Dear Sir,— As so much attention ie now being paid to 

 tea, any information about its cultivation and jat will, 

 no doubt, be of interest to your readers. I will confine 

 my remarks at present to j&t. During my visit to 

 Assam, I have paid particular attention to jat in 

 order to find out which is likely to be most Buited 

 for Ceylon. After careful consideration and repeated 

 proofs, I have come to the conclusion that "Assam 

 hybrid" is a misnomer, and that there is no such 

 thing as a hybrid in tea. This will, no doubt, 

 be considered a ra*h statement, and utterly absurd 

 and not worth listening to ; but I have no doubt what- 

 ever on the point myself, and I will explain how; I have 

 arrived at the conclusion. The popular idea is that 

 Assam indigenous is one plant, and China another, and 

 that these two species having been planted in close 

 proximity have hybridized, and ihat the result is a 

 hybrid called Assam hybrid. We must not forget that 

 hybrids are extremely lare things in nature, and where 

 hybridizing does take ploce.it is by artificial means. 

 Bees and insects of various kinds are said to carry the 

 pollen from one flower to another, but who taught 

 them to carry out their work of hybridizing so system- 

 aticully and carry the pollen from the China t<> the 

 Assam? Why not carry from the Assam to the China t 

 In the former case, the Assam crossed by the China, 

 results in "Assam hybrid," and m the latter it would 

 be "China hybrid." China hybrid is a term used, but 

 it is not got in this way— it is used to indicate a low 

 jit of plant. Is it not natural to suppose, that, if the 

 As«am deteriorates by being crossed by China, the 

 China would be improved by being crossed by the 

 Assam? This, however, is not the case : no improved jat 

 is ever the result; therefore it is no hybrid I have 

 ha 1 opportunities of tracing the seed from the in- 

 digenous trees growing in the jungle down to the lowest 

 jat. It runs in a downward scale. Seed from the 

 indigenous produces a fine plant which we '11 call 

 No. 1. Setd from No. 1 produces a plant slightly 

 inferior, which is No. 2. No. 2 produces a plant 

 inferior to it again, and so on until you get down to 

 a jat of the lowest description. This to me is per- 

 fectly clear as I have traced them and find no difficulty 

 in discovering what they are ; that is under ordinary 

 circumsiances. Of course, there are places, which from 

 want of cultivation, unsuitable soil or some other 

 cause show a jat which might be anything. Assam 

 planters do not admit that the plant they are growing 

 is not a hybrid, but I think most of them are cogniz- 

 ant of the fact that the plant does deteriorate 

 and that seed from one jat always turns out an inferior 

 jat to the parent. The question then to decide is, 

 w hich of the different grades of plant is the one to grow. 

 Having settled that, secure seed not from flu.' jat of 

 plant you want, but from the jat above it which pro- 

 duced that plant. 



The indigenous plant is generally supposed to be 

 too delicate and unsuitable for Ceylon, and that a lower 

 jilt is the thing to grow. I cannot myself see 1 ow this 

 conclusion was arrived at. The indigenous plant is 

 not found on the plains of Assam, but on the hills, 

 and 1 could mention several estates in Dimbula with 

 very much the same soil and lay of land as where 

 this plant is flourishing. The elevation is not so 

 much of course as on some of the Ceylon hills, but 

 I don't suppose the plant would object to grow at a 

 higher elevation any more than it does at a lower. 

 The soil on the hills is different from the stiff soil 



on the plains, just as different as the soil on the 

 Maskeliya flats is from the soil at Avisawella. Ceylon 

 soil on the hills resembles the soil of the hills to 

 which the Assam plant is indigenous much more than 

 the soil on the Assam plains. The jats once or twice 

 removed from the indigenous are considered quite as 

 good yielding jats, but anything below that no one 

 would now think of phtntmg. Ceylon men will regret 

 the way they have goue about getting seed by and bye, 

 and they won't find out their mistake until they find 

 that the flushing powers of their bushes are very much 

 less than estates which have got a better jat. The 

 difference between a good jat and a bad one is the 

 difference between profit and loss. A large quantity of 

 Indian seed sent to Ceylon is not worth the carriage. 

 No man iu Assam would think of putting it out, 

 although he got it for nothing. Orders are sent up from 

 Ceylon for hybrid seed at R30 a maund, and hybrid 

 seed is supplied at this rate. No complaints are made 

 about jat or class of plant— if 70 to 80 per cent is found 

 good in Colombo, the Ceylon planter takes his seed and 

 looks happy. 



How different it is with an Assam man opening out 

 a newgarden. He paysR150 a maund for his seed, sends 

 a man to the garden to see it picked, has it tested, 

 packed after his own instructions and taken away by 

 his own man and pays all packing charges and transport. 

 I had an opportunity of seeing this operation carried 

 out and got the wrinkles about testing seed. Has this 

 ever been done with seed sent to Ceylon ? If it has, I 

 have not heard of it. Ceylon men must recollect that 

 no blame can be attached to Assam men for send- 

 iug them a bad jat: they know perfectly well that 

 good seed sells from R100 to R150 a maund, and 

 yet they are satisfied with seed costing R30. If the 

 Assam men charged the high price and supplied a 

 bad jat of seed, then they would be to blame, but 

 as far as I can see they are perfectly straight about 

 it. They sell seed fiom £20 to R200 a maund, and 

 Ceylon men prefer to take the cheapest. Wheu good 

 seed is offered to Colombo firms, they say : "No, we can 

 get seed cheaper." My advice to Ceylon men who are 

 going in for tea is, get as good a jat as you can— 

 (and this can be got by paying for it), it will flush better, 

 is much more easily managed, withstands red spider, 

 Helopellis, greenfly and all the other pests far better 

 than the low jats. — Yours faithfully, R. L. 



[With all deference to this writer, we take it that 

 the question of hybrids having resulted from the 

 contiguity of the Assam and China teas, is no more 

 doubtful than the question of cinchona hybrids. We 

 should not wish to found any conclusion on our own 

 experience, but certainly between 5 000 to G, 000 feet, 

 while the seed we got as best hybrid jat has flourished, 

 what was sent to us as indigenous (both from the 

 As-am Company), has hung back. — Ed. 



THE WANT OF CARE IN SELECTING 

 TEA SEED. 



Dear Sir,— Your able article on tea cultivation in 

 a recent paper brings forcibly before me a subject 

 upon which 1 have felt very strongly during the last 

 eighteen months, viz , the want of care in gathering 

 and selecting tea seed and the urgent necessity there 

 is for each one to endeavour to strengthen by using 

 only good seed rather than by filling nurseries with 

 inferior seed to weaken the naturally vigorous plant. 



I have always held to the opinion that Hemileia 

 vaslatrix was in the island years before it was dis- 

 covered on coffee and that the disease was accelerated 

 by the reckless planting of plants and stumps collected 

 from old weedy estates, many of them grown from 

 immature coffee ; others hacked and denuded of bark 

 by mamoty-weeding. In fact so great was the hurry 

 to plant up estates between 1S66 and 1876 that any- 



