FOREST AND AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION 



H if,, t. 



Treatment. 



Oreen 

 Cardamoms. 



ELETTARIA 



CARDAMOMUM 



Cultivation 



it should be seen that each cutting contains at least three perfect shoots. 

 Holes a foot deep and six or seven feet apart each way are now dug all over the 

 specially cleared plot or garden, and the seedlings or sets are deposited within 

 these, but they must not be buried too deeply as they are liable to rot off. The 

 flowering season is April to May. It is a good plan to bank up around the clumps Banking up. 

 nil ltHv<>s mid rubbish obtainable, since this helps to support and encourage the 

 growth of the creeping racemes. If at this stage the flowering branches (racemes) 

 get submerged, the soil is washed away, the roots exposed, and the flowers and 

 units ruiiH'd with tho wiitor and mud. The fruit should not be allowed to ripen Proper Maturity. 

 fully, us the capsules will then burst and the seeds be lost. They should be col- 

 j nst us they begin to turn from green to yellow. In August and September 

 iln-y swell, and by the first half of October have usually attained the desired 

 degree of ripening. The crop is accordingly gathered in October and November, 

 iiinl in exceptionally moist weather the harvest may be protracted into December. 

 A dry day is best for harvest. The jscapes or shoots bearing the clusters of 

 fruits are broken off close to the stems and placed in baskets lined with fresh 

 leaves. At night time they are carried to the temporary hut used by the men. 

 After partaking of a meal and often working far into the night, the men separate 

 carefully the capsules from the shoots, placing them as removed into a pit dug 

 on purpose in the middle of the hut. In the morning the women arrive and 

 carry the produce off to the homestead, where the further treatment is con- 

 ducted. The fruits are spread out on carefully prepared floors, sometimes 

 covered with mats, and are then exposed to the sun. At night they are carried 

 within doors, as also during showers. Four or five days of careful drying and 

 bleaching in the sun are usually enough, but in rainy weather artificial heat Drying. 

 may be necessary, though the fruits suffer very greatly in colour when this 

 course has to be resorted to, and are in consequence sometimes bleached with 

 steam and sulphurous vapour or with ritha nuts (see p. 979). The sun-dried carda- 

 moms are the best, and in trade are spoken of as " green cardamoms." The 

 capsules are now rubbed by the hand or shaken within mats, in order to brush 

 off the pedicels, calyces, particles of dust, etc., then are winnowed, hand-picked 

 and assorted according to size, colour and degree of ripeness, etc. for on the 

 racemes there must always be a percentage of overripe as also of underripe fruits. 



2. Agricultural Production. Very little of a satisfactory nature can Agricul- 

 be learned of the systems pursued or of the extent of agricultural pro- tural 

 duction in India. Mollison (Textbook Ind. Agri., iii., 262) gives a brief Lands - 

 but instructive account. He there speaks of the crop being extensively 

 grown in the betel-palm and pepper gardens of the Sirsi and Siddapur 

 Talukas of Kanara. It thrives under the same conditions of soil, etc., situation, 

 but by preference is grown in a cool, very shady garden with soil kept 

 continuously moist. In Kanara the crop is chiefly raised from seed. 

 The sowing season is September-October. But the beds require both Seed, 

 shade and shelter from the sun and rain. If the seeds germinate too Season - 

 thickly they should be thinned out and the seedlings transplanted into 

 rice seed-beds, but shaded by a temporary protection of palm-leaves. 

 When four feet high and fifteen to eighteen months old, they may 

 be carried to their permanent positions and finally transplanted 

 from March to June, or again from September to October. Pits 18 

 inches square and 18 inches deep are dug in the same lines as the betel- 

 palms and intermediate between two trees. Into these pits the car- 

 damoms are deposited and supplied yearly, in March and April, with leaf- 

 manure. They come into bearing but do not yield much during the 

 first year after transplanting. . The flowers appear somewhat irregularly Flowering. 

 in April and May, and the fruits form in June and July. The capsules 

 are in season in September and October. Each should be severed 

 from the scape and not plucked. If plucked, the pressure of the fingers Plucking, 

 may burst the capsule. After being dried in the sun for two or three 

 days the fruits are hand-rubbed to remove the attached stalk and calyx. Treatment. 

 A too hot sun or too long exposure to the sun may dry the fruits (capsules) 



515 



Final 



Transplantation. 



Seasons. 



