BCEHMERIA 

 NIVKA 



Bengal 



CHINA-GRASS AND RAMIE 



Tobacco versus 

 Rhea. 



Restricted 

 Cultivation. 



Rice and Jute 



Land 



Favourable. 



Physical 

 Features. 



Unusual 



Climatic 

 Conditions. 



Methods of 

 Cultivation. 



Seasons. 



Weeding and 



Hoeing. 



Manure. 



Length of 

 Shoots. 



Selected 

 Cuttings. 



above height of prolonged inundation, but possessed of free subsoil moisture 

 (which in Rangpur is about 3 feet below the surface) ; the fields have, 

 moreover, to be manured and carefully tended. In Rangpur wherever 

 soil of a rich sandy loam occurs, there kankura cultivation may be 

 expected, and wherever heavy clay soils appear there it disappears. In 

 other words, wherever a situation and soil suitable for tobacco is met 

 with, there rhea may be found, and when grown on fields it is rotated with 

 tobacco and ginger. Of Bogra the same remarks may be made, viz. 

 that tobacco and rhea occur on sandy loam, rotating with chillies and 

 sweet potatoes, but that the absence of all these is universal with the 

 appearance of red-clay soils. 



It is hardly necessary to repeat similar observations regarding the other 

 districts of Northern and North-Eastern Bengal. The plant is not grown in 

 every district, nor in all parts of the same districts where it is met with. In 

 Dinajpur, for example, it is confined to the northern tracts ; in Rangpur, Bogra, 

 Jalpaiguri and Kuch Behar, similar isolations exist. In other words, there are 

 conditions that seem to have arbitrarily restricted production in the past and 

 which are admitted freely by the cultivators as favourable or unfavourable 

 to the crop to-day. One instance may be given at once. Rhea will not grow 

 as a field crop nor even as a profitable garden plant to the south of Bogra in 

 the rice and jute clay lands. But much more obscure though doubtless of equal 

 value are the botanical facts I have endeavoured to deal with in my report. The 

 comparative absence of leguminous plants, both as wild species or as field and 

 garden crops, is a most significant feature of the rhea country. So again im- 

 portance must, I believe, be attributed to the appearance of certain peculiar 

 garden crops, not met with outside the area in question. Of these I would 



Specially mention Xfnlva vet'ticlllnta,, C/u-i/*" """'"""" ?orowti*ti, Brantii<-ti 

 t-nitcifoiin (a plant closely allied to Chinese cabbage) and Rumex vesicarius, 

 which, with the green tops and flowering shoots of rhea itself, are all ex- 

 tensively eaten as vegetables and take the place very largely of the peas 

 and beans of other parts of India. So again Corcitorun caj>mii<irin is very 

 possibly a native of China and that plant is common in Eastern and Northern 

 Bengal and Assam, while c. oiifi-iu* is the jute of the other districts of 

 Bengal and of India generally. These are striking coincidences if that be the 

 view taken of them. In my opinion they have a far higher value, and justify 

 the conclusion that there are climatic and other physical conditions intimately 

 associated with the restriction of the area of what might be called the Indian 

 commercial (or rather, successful) production of rhea to the tract of country 

 indicated a country that might be said more closely to resemble the rhea area- 

 of China than of any part of India. 



Methods of Cultivation. In Bengal rhea is propagated by root cuttings, 

 though the system of burying stem-cuttings horizontally is sometimes pursued,, 

 more especially to fill up vacancies and to increase the number of plants in the 

 field. The cuttings are usually 6 to 9 inches in length and planted under 3 to 4 

 inches of soil. They are placed from 1 to 3 feet apart each way. There are said 

 to be two seasons for transplanting, the first in April to May (before the commence- 

 ment of the rains), and the second in September to October (at the close of 

 the rains). The majority of cultivators favour the former season. The 

 fields are weeded and hoed after each cutting and heavily manured every year 

 during the cold season. Unless so treated, and liberally, the plants should be 

 removed into new plots of land after two, three, or at most four years, according 

 to the fertility of the soil. 



Number of Cuttings. The shoots are cut down when the bottom portion 

 of the stem begins to turn a brown colour. At this stage the leaves, low down 

 on the stem, also begin to fall off. Two to four or even five cuttings are obtained 

 a year, the shoots being 4 to 5 feet in height. The majority of cultivators mention 

 three cuttings as a good average crop. Two cuttings they regard as indicative 

 of neglectful cultivation, and five or six, they hold, can only be obtained from very 

 small plots, shaded, heavily manured and freely watered. As a rule the entire 

 plot is cut down at one and the same time, but occasionally the more intelligent 

 cultivators select the stems when ripe, and thus practically cut only small quanti- 

 ties at a time, but throughout the year. 



