December, '13] wolcott: west Indian and demeraran notes 445 



profitable as is sugar production at present in Trinidad, the tendency 

 would be to cultivate only the more productive fields. How unfor- 

 tunate and undesirable this practice is in connection with attempting 

 to control the insect and fungus pests of cane will be discussed later. 



In Barbados, the methods in vogue are the result of very cheap 

 and abundant labor, the high price of land and the nature of the 

 water supply. Everything is done on the most minute scale and by 

 most antiquated and laborious methods. The island itself is small, 

 and two thirds of the entire area is devoted to the cultivation of 

 sugar cane. Modern factories are unknown and the cane is ground 

 by small mills, which, in the majority of cases are driven by windmills. 

 Most of the windmills are of the picturesque four-armed Dutch type. 

 In some cases the rollers are vertical, although most of them are 

 horizontal, and the cane is fed to the crushers by hand. The interior 

 of the factory is very clean and sanitary, but everywhere manual 

 labor is used instead of machines. Two men work the big ladle 

 which transfers the juice from oiie evaporating pan to another and 

 the concentrated juice is carried to the centrifugals in pails on the 

 heads of negro women. 



Another result of the cheap labor is that it is possible to cultivate 

 the cane much better and cleaner than is done anywhere else. The 

 entire absence of weeds is indeed remarkable and the more so when 

 one considers that although the straight rows seem to invite mechan- 

 ical cultivation, it is never attempted. The soil is black and of very 

 good texture, but thin in most places. The coraline rock outcrops 

 in many places and is never far beneath the soil. Rainfall in Barbados 

 is comparatively slight and were it not for the coral rock, which acts 

 as a sponge, conserving the rainfall and soaking up water from the 

 sea, agriculture would be impossible. Capillarity brings the water 

 up in to the soil from the surface of the rock and even in the dryest 

 seasons the soil is moist at the depth of a foot. Soil moisture is further 

 conserved by a thick mulch of cane trash, which is placed about all 

 young plant cane. The wind often blows it away and it is carefully 

 put back in place by the laborers. 



From this short outhne of the varying conditions under which cane 

 is grown in Demerara, Trinidad and Barbados, it might well be expected 

 to find a similar diversity in the insect pests affecting the cane. Such, 

 in general, is the case. The cosmopolitan Diatrcea saccharalis Fabr., 

 however, occurs in all the countries and does more injury to the stalk 

 than any other insect. Pseudococcus calceolarice Mask., is also a com- 

 mon pest on cane, but its injury is not so generally considered serious. 



In Demerara, the smaller moth borer, Diatrcea saccharalis Fabr., 

 and the closely allied species, D. lineolata Walker and D. canella 



