IGO LEAVES FOR FODDER. 



CHAPTER IV.— UTILIZATION OF THE LEAVES OF 

 TREES AND SHRUBS. 



The leaves of trees and shrubs are used principally for fodder, 

 manure, litter, and thatching. On a smaller scale they yield drugs 

 (nim, Viteai Negundo, senna, Adhatoda Vasica, &c.), material for 

 dyeing (Indigoferas, Lawsonia alba, &c.), and tanning [Anogeissus, 

 Rhus, ^c), and for matting, basket-making, and paper manufac- 

 ture (various palms). The number of species which serve these 

 last mentioned purposes is, however, so small, and the quantity of 

 leaves that is actually used, or is ever likely to be required, is so 

 insignificant, that arrangements for meeting the demand for them, 

 without injuring the stock or the resources of the forests, will 

 never present any difficulty. 



Section I. — Leaves foe foddbe. 



For fodder, leaves must of course be plucked or lopped green, 

 as otherwise they would have no nutritive value. Moreover, the 

 leaves of most fodder-yielding species are relished by cattle only 

 while they are young and tender, since they afterwards either be- 

 come too tough and fibrous or acquire an unpleasant flavour. It 

 is scarcely necessary to say that only broad-leaved species yield 

 fodder. 



The nutritive value of tree-fodder, as compared with that of the 

 best meadow grass, is as 100 to 125. Lopped twigs and small 

 branches contain from 40 to 60 per cent, by weight of leaves and 

 edible stem-portions. 



The practice of lopping is always harmful. Besides robbing the 

 plants of assimilating organs and causing disfigurement and intro- 

 ducing the germs of unsoundness, it deprives the soil of manure 

 more valuable than that furnished by the grass growing under 

 them. This higher value is due to the leaves being less fibrous 

 and decomposing more readily, and also to the fact that the total 

 mass of leaves produced by canopied trees is larger than the entire 

 quantity of grass growing below. Moreover, leaves are extremely 

 rich in nitrogen and contain up to 8 per cent, of ash, a very large 

 proportion of which consists of potash and phosphates. When 

 wood alone is utilised, nearly all these constituents, which have 

 been collected and brought to the surface by the roots from an im- 



