80 



year, I am sure it is worth experiment, It would avoid two hoeings 

 per annum, and although two of these given would have to be 

 deeper than is usual, yet the total labour would probably be less than 

 before, and a large amount of valuable matter, otherwise washed 

 out would be retained in the soil. 



SUMMARY re GREEN MANURING. 



Summing up therefore, green manuring has already proved 

 a success where it has been tried, but the crops used up-to-date with 

 success have only been mustard and Mali Kalai, The latter is 

 usually the best, and has been used the most. It (i) gives more 

 healthy bushes ; (2) increases the crop ; (3) improves the texture of 

 heavy soil ; (4) is said to keep off green fly while it occupies the 

 ground ; and (5) acts as a direct manure by fixing the nitrogen of 

 the air. It is best sown at the rate of half a maund per acre either 

 in May or at the end of August, and in each case should be hoed 

 in after about six weeks. Other crops have been suggested for green 

 manuring but have, as yet, received no adequate trial. Finally there 

 seem distinct arguments in favour of regularly having the ground 

 covered with a green manuring crop during a great part of nearly 

 every rains, and thus making it a normal part of tea culture instead 

 of a special occasional means of manuring. 



LEGUMINOUS TREES AMONG THE TEA, 



In connection with this subject of green manuring, that of the 

 use of leguminous and other trees among the tea must be consider- 

 ed, and the question of their value or otherwise has formed one 

 of the vexed questions of tea culture for many years. I cannot do 

 better perhaps than reprint Mr. Hooper's summary of the history of 

 the use of the sau tree (Albizzia stipulata) for the purpose of ferti- 

 lising tea gardens. (Vide Dr. Watt's Pests and Blights of the Tea 

 Plant 1898) He writes : 



" Several years ago Colonel Hannay (in Dibrugarh, Assam) called attention to the value 

 of the sau tree, and gave it the name of the tea fertilising tree. * * To Mr. J. Bucking- 

 ham belongs the honour of having prominently drawn attention to the value of the sau tree. 

 Several experiments were made by him which went to prove that sau possessed peculiar 

 properties in bringing round exhausted soils and causing the bushes to flush vigorously, 

 while imparting a vitality of which old tea was deficient. On the 2nd October, 1884, 

 Mr. Buckingham published, for the benefit of ihe Indian Tea Association, a little 

 pamphlet on this subject, which gave his own experience and that of several planters 

 regarding the sau tree. Shade is not usually the cause of an increase in yield, and is in 

 fact condemned by the generality of planters, as it tends to make the bush throw out 

 long stalky shoots, and thus to produce poor and woody flushes ; such, however, can hardly 



