xxxiv. Timehri. 



of sugar-cane. On such lands the results of the application of the lime 

 should be equivalent in the first crop to those of a dressing of 200 lbs. of 

 sulphate of ammonia per acre whilst for several years the lime will result 

 in larger, but gradually decreasing crops. Planters must decide whether 

 they will apply lime to their soils by consideratien of the relative cost of 

 sulphate of ammonia and of lime landed here together with the much 

 greater cost of applying the latter to their fields. 



(b) The colony possesses a vast store, some 200,000 tons a year, of 

 rice-straw much of which should be utilisable as a mulch or a manure. 

 I believe that the use of rice-straw as a mulch on the fields of young- 

 canes to be later forked in between the banks will result in increased 

 yields of sugar — possibly from the first year's application of not more 

 than a ton to 2 tons of stripped canes per acre but that this will increase 

 from applications in successive years to perhaps as much as 5 tons of 

 sugar cane or, say, 8 cwts. of commercial sugar per acre. 



It is certain to my mind that the skilled application and forking in 

 of rice-straw year after year will greatly ameliorate the texture of the 

 heavy clay sugar-cane lands and increase their productive power. Here 

 again the planter must calculate the cost of the application as compared 

 with the probable value of its ameliorant action. 



(c) It is commonly assumed that the sugar-planters of British 

 Guiana ignore and have always ignored the advantages they are assured 

 they must obtain if they plant legumes as an ameliorant for the soils. 

 The great majority of us have forgotten, even if we ever knew, about the 

 large scale trials made in 1896 and 1897 with Bengal beans and other 

 pulses. Most careful trials were made by some of our then most 

 advanced and experienced planters. In many casss the beans grew well, 

 so well and luxuriantly in fact that they killed off all weeds and all stray 

 sugar-canes which were growing in the fields the beans -were sown in. The 

 trials were instituted and arranged by the late Mr. R. Bird of Mauri ius 

 who visited this colony for that specific purpose. 



The growth of the beans was all that could be desired and there 

 appeared a certain prospect that a completely snccessful substitute for 

 manuring with sulphate of ammonia had been obtained. Dirncultns, 

 however, arose with regan I to cutting-down and burying the great mass 

 of vegetation on the fields. Sulphate of ammonia was then cheap, costing 

 probably about $65 per ton locally. It was found that it cost far more to 

 produce, cut-down and bury 67 lbs. of combined nitrogen in the legumes 

 than 67 lbs could be bought and applied in the form of 3 cwt. of sulphate of 

 ammonia per acre. In addition the 67 lbs of nitrogen in organic combina- 

 tion in the legume foliage was not as effective as a sugar-producer as was 

 45 lbs. applied in sulphate of ammonia. 



Other less vigorously growing legumes such as alfalfa were tried but 

 also failed. Trials were repeated inoculating the soil with the specific 

 organisms found in the root-nodule? of vigorously growing alfalfa. Again 



