328 



THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS 



October It, 1911. 



EDITORIAL NOTICES. 



Letters and matter for publication, as well as all 

 specimens for naming, should be addressed to the 

 OftDimissioner, Imperial Department of Agriculture, 

 Barbados. 



All applications for Copies of the 'Agricultural 

 News' should be addressed to the Agents, and not to 

 the Department. 



Local Agents: Messrs. Bowen & Sons, Bridge- 

 town, Barbados. London Agents: Messrs. Dulau & 

 Co,, 37, Soho Square, W. A complete list of Agents 

 will be found on page 3 of the cover. 



T\'\e Agricidturcd News: Price Itl per number, 

 post free 2rf. Annual subscription payable to Agents, 

 2s. 2d Post free, 4s. 4f?. 



gigriciiltiiral |lnu!i 



Vol. X. SATURDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1911. No. 247. 



t ■ 



NOTES AND COMMENTS. 



Contents of Present Issue. 



The cditorifd in the present issue deals with the 

 subject of The Spirit of Agricultural Investigation. Its 

 purpose is to .'-how in a broad way how such investiga- 

 tion should be undertaken, and the manner in which 

 the results should be presented and interpreted. 



Page 323 contair's an abstract of an interesting 

 article that has appeared recently, dealing with the rela- 

 tion between the content of sucrose and that of j)otash 

 in cane juice. 



The matter on page 324 includes information con- 

 cerning the recent fruiting of a ' male' nutmeg tree in 

 St. Liieia, and in connexion \vith trials of the coco-de- 

 mer, or double cocoa-nut, that have been made in some 

 of the islands of the West Indies. 



Among other matters, tiage 325 gives an illustrated 

 note on the Litchi in Dominica. 



The Insect Notes, on page 330, include articles 

 dealing respectively with the House-Fly and Man, and 

 the Locomotion of Young Scale Insects. 



Page 331 ccintains an artirlc which deals with 

 the ])reseiit position as regards the employment of fer- 

 mented milk in certain complaints aud diseases. 



I On page 334, there appears the first of two articles 

 on Wounds in I'laius and Their Treatment. In the ne.xt 

 number of the Agricnltiind Neiv.s, remarks will be 

 •made on some other forms of wounds and their treat- 

 'meiit, and a few points having a general connexion with 

 *tho subject will also be considered. 



Studies of Soil Bacteria. 



Woi'k that has been undertaken during the last 

 two years in connexion with the study of soils and soil 

 bacteria receives attention in the Bulletin of the 

 Barciiii of Agricaltural Intelligence and of Plant 

 Di,.^eascs for January 1911, p. 48. One of the con- 

 clusions that have been reached is that certain soil 

 bacteria fivonr the formation of nodules on the roots of 

 leguuiinous plants such as serradella {Ornithopus 

 saticus). The action of the bacteria is to cause the 

 enLu-.'en.ent of the nodules, whereby a greater quan- 

 tity of nitrogen is produced than if the effect had been 

 that of the noiJule organisms alone. 



Funhi-r work has been connected with the decom- 

 position of rocks to form soil, and ii; is now demonstra- 

 t>?d that leguminous plants can extract a much larger 

 amount of plant food from unweathered rocks than can 

 plants belonging to the Crass Family. 



Lime and Magnesia in Soils. 



The lUiral Caiifornian, Vol. XXXIV, p. 3.5S, con- 

 tains a report of observations made for the purpose of 

 determining the causes of a ceitain type of malnutri- 

 tion in orange and lemon trees. One of the signs of 

 this malnutrition is the existence of what is termed 

 mottled leaf, in such plants. The conclusion was that 

 the condition was due to the presence of large amounts 

 of magnesium in the S')il, in proportion to the lime. 



Analyses were made both of healthy and urdiealthy 

 leaves, when the former were found to cont dn an e>cess 

 of potash and phosphoric acid, while they were deficient 

 in lime. Analyses of the soil in which the plants were 

 growing correlated the condition of unheahhiness with 

 the presence of the excess of magnesia over lime. 



The reason for the exce.=s of potash in the leaves 

 appeared to be connected with the circumstance that 

 the plants were not obtaining sufficient lime from the 

 soil for their needs, so that they absorbed abnormal 

 amounts of potash for the purposes of the neutralization 

 of the acids in them. 



Calcium Cyanamide and Nitrate of Lime. 



The Journal of the Royal Horticultural Society 

 for I\lay 1911 (to which reference was made in the last 

 number of the Agricultural Ncius, p. 313) contains 

 an account of experiments in which the above men- 

 tioned manures were compared with nitrate of soda 

 and sulphate of ammonia. In the experiments, the 

 land received a dressing of superphosphate and kainit: 

 the ipiantity of nitrate of soda applied per acre was 

 4 cwt, while the amounts of the other manures yielding 

 nitrogen were at such a rate that each plot was in 

 receipt of the same weight of that element. The crop 

 employed was turnips, and the results .showed that 

 there was little to choose between the different man- 

 ures as sources of nitrogen. 



Notes on trials of these manures have been given 

 several times in the Agricultural News. In the 



