387 



decayed leaves, which in the case of. pine-apples will take a Ions 

 time to become humus. 



Financially we may reckon the cost of cultivation up to the 

 time of bearing, i.e., during 2 years, at $75 per acre in Singapore. 

 This includes clearing jungle, cost of pine-apple seedlings, 

 holing and planting the rubber and clean weeding during two years. 

 Of this amount, the contractor must make a profit of from 15 to 

 20 dollars. It is useless to attempt this cultivation except througli 

 contractors, unless good supervision — which cannot be had cheap - is 

 available. The receipts can be put down in a tabular form : — 



2nd year ... 2000 pines (" 2 cents each $40 



3rd „ ... 3000 „ „ 2 „ „ 60 



4th 2000 „ „ 1^-2 M 30 



$130 



This means that the planter recovers the cost of planting plus $55 

 to the good, out of which, if he will spend $25 on a ton of a fertilizer 

 such as the Pedis guano or similar substance, he will surely find 

 that his Hevea trees will grow as well as they can possibly do. If 

 one had the leisure and time, one could easily prove all these assertions 

 by figures of measurements and by photographs. But, of course, 

 if you allow an ignorant yokel to cram 3,300 pine-apple plants within 

 one acre and in addition thereto stick in 250 rubber seedlings, and 

 during five years do nothing but take away pine-apples and clean 

 weed, you must expect that the soil becomes impoverished and the 

 rubber trees are retarded in their growth. 



At the end of the 3rd or at the latest at the end of the 4th year, 

 the pine-apple plants should be removed. The root stocks should 

 be pulled up and piled in heaps till the leaves are dried. 0)i no 

 account bwy t/ieni in trenches, such as some rubber experts have re- 

 commended, for within a month they will be infected with white ants. 

 The heaps, when properly dried, sh(Hild be lightly covered with earth, 

 and set on fire and allowed to smoulder away. Care should be taken 

 that the heaps are not too large, and that the fire should not burst 

 into flame. The debris becomes excellent manure, and should be broad- 

 casted but not buried. The root-stocks of the pine-apples will resist 

 burning in the first instance and they should be collected and re- 

 burned. The operation should be repeated time after time till every 

 bit is reduced to cinders. If any planter will carry out these opera- 

 tions faithfully he will find that pine-apples are an ideal catch-crop, 

 especially in the vicinity of Singapore or any big town, where the 

 fruit can be sold at a profit. The fear that the pine-apples will do 

 harm is quite imaginary and arises solely out of ignorance of the 

 actual conditions that obtain in ordinary pine-apple culture. The 

 harm done is due to the abuse of a catch-crop and not at all to the 

 proper inter-planting of the pine-apples in the midst of the rubber. 



