SOME. NOTES ON THE PADI INDUSTRY OF KRIAN, “WITH 
Me SHORT DESCRIPTION OF SOME OF THE PRINGIPAL 
VARIETIES GROWN THERE.* 
By H. W. CHAMBRE LEECH, LL.D., C.E., B.L. 
Padi and sugar growing are the principal, | may say the sole, 
industries of Krian, the northern district of Perak, a flat alluvial plain 
raised but a few feet above the sea. 
There are many varieties of padi grown in Krian, and I have selected 
twenty of the most distinctive; but before proceeding to describe them, a 
short account of the method of cultivation, etc., may prove interesting. 
When the wet season begins, generally early in September, the 
first thing done is to plant the nurseries. For this a small patch of 
ground a few yards square is carefully cleared and the grain scattered on 
it broadcast, so thickly as to nearly hide the earth. With the early 
rains this germinates in a few days, but in the meantime birds, rats and 
insects have levied aheavy tax on it. In about a month or six weeks the 
young plants are from a foot to eighteen inches high and ready for trans- 
planting. While the nurseries are coming on, the land is prepared. As 
soon as the rains set in and flood the land, the weeds and grass, which 
have grown two or three feet high since the last harvest, are cut down 
with an instrument called a fazak, which may be described as a straight 
scythe with a heavy blade about fifteen inches long, with which the roots 
of the grass and weeds are chopped rather than cut. After being left to 
rot for some time on the land, these weeds are dragged with large rakes 
into heaps and are then formed into ridges or banks dividing the whole 
country into a number of little fields, varying in size from a few poles 
to an acre or more in extent. By the aid of these banks the planters 
are enabled to regulate the water, letting it flow from one field to another. 
In some places—the centre and north of Province Wellesley and 
S’tiawan, for example—where the land is stiffer, it is necessary to plough 
it, but whenever | suggested ploughing to the padi planters in Krian 
I was told that it would increase the growth of the straw at the expense 
of the grain. 
When the fields are prepared and the nursery plants sufficiently grown, 
the women begin planting out. Hitherto all the work has been done by 
the men, but the women alone do the transplanting. For this they use 
an instrument called a kuku kambing BartS 9598 (goat’s toe), which con- 
* The following notes were originally prepared to accompany some exhibits for the 
Indian and Colonial Exhibition of 1886, and have been re-written for Musewm Notes. 
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