PROSOPIS 401 



well. I looked for these plants when I next visited Phillaur in July 1912, but 

 found very few left, and these had made poor growth. A few hundred yards 

 off there was a natural seedling of P. juliflora growing in a jfield, and the growth 

 made by this plant in the four years 1908-12 was very marked. The 

 rainfall in Phillaur is about 30 inches. In 1909 I tried P. juliflora in a grassy 

 blank in one of the scrub forests in Hazara. I saw the sowings about a year 

 later and found that the plants had made very poor growth and gave little 

 promise of surviving. In this case the rainfall was 30-40 inches. 



' The spread of P. juliflora over grass-lands in parts of America has been 

 attributed to the stocking of the country with cattle, which graze down the 

 grass and weaken it, and thus enable the tree to compete successfully against 

 it. In the cases of failure with P. juliflora mentioned above there was a fairly 

 heavy grass growth and protection from grazing, and it seems that this may 

 have been responsible for the bad results. The rainfall could not have been 

 responsible except perhaps indirectly by favoring the growth of other plants, 

 as the natural seedling in Phillaur showed. This seedling was in a place 

 where grass and jungle were kept down by cattle. Cattle and even goats 

 seem to do little harm to P. juliflora, and I have often been surprised to see 

 the leaves untouched, although within easy reach of cattle and at a time 

 when there is little green fodder available. 



' As regards frost-hardiness, I have seen seedlings pass through a winter 

 at Abbottabad (4,000 ft.) uninjured, so that it may be regarded as quite 

 hardy anywhere in the plains of India. 



' The habit of P. juliflora is peculiar : most of the trees and all the natural 

 seedlings I have seen branch at ground level, giving several crooked branches. 

 . . . There is, however, an erect form, and the two big specimens in Khushalgarh 

 had an upright habit not unlike that of Acacia arabica. This form, however, 

 is not constant, as the seedlings from the Khushalgarh trees all showed the usual 

 crooked habit. 



' As regards the rate of growth of P. juliflora, G. B. Sudworth says in 

 " Forest Trees of the Pacific Slope " : "The tree is unquestionably long lived, 

 though of exceedingly slow growth. Trunks 10-12 inches in diameter are from 

 100 to 125 years old, while the larger trunks occasionally found are likely to 

 be very much older." This does not apply to the tree in India, as it has only 

 been introduced some 35 years, and specimens 6-8 inches in diameter are 

 not infrequent. . . . 



' As a drought-resister I know of no tree to equal P. juliflora. It has 

 been used with success to clothe some old brick-kiln mounds in the Govern- 

 ment Agri-Horticultural Gardens, Lahore. The average rainfall in Lahore 

 is 19 inches, and of this a large portion usually falls in heavy showers on one 

 or two days in the year and runs off the steep slopes of the mounds so that the 

 trees have to manage with considerably less than 19 inches of effective rain. 

 Two years in succession of deficient rain has caused some of the plants on the 

 top of the mounds to lose the tips of their shoots, but although there must be 

 fully 100 specimens I have not seen a single one that has died of drought. 

 On the very top of one of these mounds a sowing was made in 1911. The 

 seedlings were not watered, and the rainfall in 1911 and 1912 was 13 and 

 14 inches respectively. When I last saw the place about a month ago, a good 

 many plants were left. The place is much frequented, and the survivors all 

 showed signs of having been trodden on, so that it is quite likely that those 

 which died, died from having been trodden on and not from deficient moisture. 

 Mr. Brown, Superintendent of Farms, N.-W. F. Province, tells me he has 

 P. juliflora growing luxuriantly on the crest of a dry bank near Peshawar. 

 The plants were planted in February 1911, and were not watered; the rainfall 

 in 1911 amounted to 13 inches, and to 8 inches in 1912. The ability of this 

 plant to withstand drought is astonishing, especially as it comes into leaf early 

 in April and remains green right through the hot weather. 



2307.2 -c. 



