190 PEEMANENT NTJESEIlIEa. 



manure, and, in addition the seeds themselves might suflFer from 

 excessive moisture. In the impracticability of employing the 

 percolation system, it is better to hand-water than to irrigate. 



The moisture of the soil must, with only a single exception, be 

 constantly maintained until germination is complete, and water 

 must, therefore, be given as often as the soil begins to get dry. 

 The exception just referred to applies to the rare case of those 

 seeds, which possess so hard, tough and impermeable a shell, that 

 their germination is promoted by allowing the soil to quite dry up 

 before it is watered again, the porosity and facility to dehisce of 

 the shells being thereby increased. Indeed it may be found ex- 

 pedient to repeat this alternate drenching and drying more than 

 once, as with teak in Central India. In these exceptional cases 

 the watering on each occasion ought to be as copious as possible, 

 and the flooding system of irrigation may then be employed. 



After the plants have come up above ground, less frequent 

 ■watering will be necessary, but, on the other hand, more water 

 will have to be given on each occasion, and handwatering should, 

 as far as can be helped, be entirely given up. 



§ 6. Protection of the seed-beds. 



Both the seeds and the young plants are exposed to many 

 causes of injury or destruction against which they have to bo 

 protected, 



A. Protection against animals. 



Birds. — Many kinds of seeds and the tender shoots of young 

 seedlings are greedily devoured by birds. Scare-crows are of 

 little use, as most birds, especially sparrows, doves, &c., soon get 

 accustomed to them. Rattles, a good and easily made pattern of 

 which is given in Fig. 34, may be set up at different points and 

 all worked simultaneously by means of lines connected with a 

 single one worked from some central post of observation. 

 Automatic rattles, worked by the wind or flowing water, could also 

 be easily put up, and an improvement on this would be to attach 

 the rattles to figures made up like human beings. But the most 

 effective plan would be to arm a man with a gun and a few blank 

 and even loaded cartridges, or to put a strong coop of close 

 bamboo or other trellis work over the beds (Fig. 35), which 

 last device would also have the advantage of keeping out many 

 other kinds of animals. 



Hares and Porcupines — These animals generally commit their 

 depredations by night and no fence suflSciently economical can 



