440 



5. This should be done exactly in the same way as for vegeta- 



ble or flower seed which requires transplanting 

 Sowing ' after germination. The figs are broken between 



the hands. As the seed is very minute, the particles of the fruit 

 are left with the seed and sown with it, no attempt being made to 

 clean or separate the pulverized figs. In order to distribute these 

 minute seeds evenly over the seed beds or boxes, a certain quan- 

 tity of ash and soil is mixed with them. 



6. Germination takes place from the end of April to the end of 



the rains. Seed sown between October and 

 Germination. January requires daily watering and screening 



from the sun, and will not germinate before the end of April or 

 the beginning of May, but seed sown any time during the rains 

 will germinate in a few days (from five days to a fortnight). It 

 follows that the best time for sowing seed is during the rains — 

 that is from June to September. 



The embryo appears on the germination of the seed as a seed- 

 ling having a pair of opposite cotyledons with an entire margin des- 

 titute of incisions or appendage of any kind, with the exception of 

 the notched or emarginate apex, oval in general outline, green in 

 colour and of a glassy smoothness. The second pair of leaves show 

 a tendency to the alternate arrangement on the stem but appear 

 at the same time. Their shape and venation are very different 

 from those of the primary leaves, for they have a central midrib 

 and a distinctly coarsely-crenated margin. The third pairs of 

 leaves do not appear simultaneously, and are distinctly alternate, 

 with a marked reddish colour : after this the plant is easilv 

 recognized. 



7. When the seedlings are one to two inches high in the seed 



beds or boxes, they should be transplanted into 

 Pricking out. nursery beds, and put out in lines about a foot 



from each other. The nursery beds should be well-raised and 

 drained, but the soil need not be so carefully prepared as for the 

 seed beds. Here the plants are kept till the following rains, when 

 they are dug up and taken to stockaded nurseries in the forest, and 

 put out 5' x 5' on raised well-drained beds, where they remain for 

 two years till they are required for planting operations. 



8. Almost every animal will eat the young rubber plants; it is, 



therefore, impossible to plant out small seed- 

 Forest nurseries. lings in the forest owing to the destruction by 

 wild elephants and game unless each individual plant is carefully 

 fenced in. As this is too costly, and the rubber after it is one to two 

 feet in height is very hardy and can be transplanted, with ordinary 

 care, at any time of the year (the best time in Assam is between 

 May and July), the seedlings are kept in stockaded nurseries in 

 the forest where planting operations are to take place, and remain 

 there till they are 10 01; 12 feet high, that is, about three years 

 after germination, when they are dug out and the roots are cut 

 bark iS inches right around the plant and planted on the mounds 

 in the forests. 



