294 



COTTON 



The following table gives the comparative results : 



ZARIA 



ILOKIN 



It will be noticed that the yield at Zaria is greatly in 

 excess of that at Ilorin, and this, in spite of the fact that, 

 owing to scarcity of rain in the earlier part of the season, 

 it was found impossible to cultivate the soil at Zaria more 

 than 4 in. deep, whereas that at Ilorin was thoroughly 

 prepared to a depth of 8 in. Nor can the difference be 

 accounted for by irregularity of stand or stunted growth, 

 since in both these respects the Ilorin farm compared 

 very favourably with that at Zaria.. 



The cause of the almost complete failure of the Ilorin 

 crop was boll-shedding. The same trouble was encoun- 

 tered, but to a less extent, at Zaria. Boll-shedding is, of 

 course, a well-known phenomenon in every cotton-grow- 

 ing country, but on so wholesale a scale as occurred in 

 the Ilorin Province last year it is absolutely disastrous. 

 Excessive humidity or drought, and more especially 

 marked alternations of these conditions, are its recognized 

 causes. The last-named seems to have been mainly 

 responsible at Zaria, where the rain often falls in very 

 intermittent storms. At Ilorin, however, Mr. Thornton 

 who, before he joined the Department, had been 

 engaged in cotton growing for some years in the West 

 Indies attributes this abnormal boll-shedding mainly to 

 excess of rainfall and cloudy weather during the flower- 

 ing season, when the plant requires copious sunshine with 

 occasional gentle showers. 



