June, 1912.] 



513 



Edible Products. 



the plants are growing. The fertility 

 of a heated soil is greatest when the 

 ferobic organisms present are fewest. 



Such are the provisional conclusions to 

 which our experiments directly lead. It 

 only remains to consider what bearing 

 they have on the actual practical methods 

 of preparing the rice seed-bed in Western 

 India. Considered from this point of 

 view, the principal conclusion we have 

 so far been able to reach, is that no 

 method not involving a greater actual 

 out-of-pocket expenditure, seems likely 

 to yield results which are obtained with 

 the combined application of heat and of 

 wood ashes to the soil which is given in 

 the rab process. 



This being the case, it would seem that 

 attention should be laigely concentrated 

 cn obtaining the application of these by 

 a less wasteful method than the ordinary 

 burning of rab. Our experiments clearly 

 indicate that if the heating effect is ob- 

 tained, combined with the application of 

 the wood ashes, it matters little how it is 

 brought about. 



Now the rab process is obviously waste- 

 ful of heat and of fuel, if our explanation 

 of the object to be attained is the correct 

 one. No one can doubt this who has 

 watched closely the actual practice in 

 vogue, and we feel confident that the 

 quantity of fuel— that is to say, of cow- 

 dung, of branches, and of the other 

 materials employed— could be reduced to, 

 at most, one-quarter of the amount at 

 present used if, instead of its being 

 spread over the surface of the soil, the 

 latter could be burnt in heaps. At first 

 sight this would seem difficult if not im- 

 possible, but we feel this is a superficial 

 view. The area to be burnt is small, not 

 amounting to more than five gunthas 

 per acre of rice : the soil to be heated, 

 consists only of the surface layer to 

 one inch deep. Thus to plant one acre 

 of rice would require the heaping up 

 and burning of a comparatively small 

 amount of soil. 



The chief difficulties in this seem to be 

 as to how best it can be carried out, and 

 to ascertain this should be the next 

 direction that experimental work should 

 65 



take. It would not seem difficult to 

 devise a reasonable method, requiring far 

 less fuel and trouble in collecting fuel 

 than is submitted to now. That soil, 

 especially a heavy sticky, clayey soil 

 like that in these regions, can be so 

 burnt in heaps is proved by the former 

 common practice of so burning in Europe, 

 and by the practice in the fen district of 

 England at the present day. And in 

 this direction the solving of the diffi- 

 culties, both of the cultivators and of 

 those who are anxious to prevent the 

 damage to the forests and trees in the 

 rice tracts of the Deccan and Konkan, 

 seems most probably to lie. 



BANANA CULTIVATION. 

 (Musa Sapientum.) 



By H. Q. Levy, Agricultural 

 Instructor, 1912, 



Definitions. 

 Article II, 

 (Prom the Journal of the Jamaica Agri- 

 cultural Society, Vol. XVI., No. 2, 

 February, 1912.) 



Time of Year to Plant. 

 February, March, and April, are the 

 best months to plant bananas, so as to 

 meet the highest prices during the follow- 

 ing Spring. The only districts where I 

 would advocate October planting would 

 be in localities that have no March, 

 April, or May rains, for the seed sucker 

 must have sufficient moisture to start a 

 healthy growth from the eyes. In the 

 rich interior lands situated at more or 

 less high elevations, it has been the 

 practice to plant from October to 

 December, most of tbe cultivators 

 arguing that the district being colder 

 during the winter months, planting 

 should of necessity take place earlier. 

 This I have demonstrated by actual ex- 

 perience to be a fallacy. When this 

 experiment was conducted, the bananas 

 were not planted through yams, cocoes, 

 etc., as is usually the practice. The land 

 was forked before planting, and also 

 well drained. 



It is no use planting before the ground 

 has had a chance to get warm after the 



