June, 1912. J 



537 



Miscellaneous. 



Plants derived from seeds specially 

 selected at Heneratgoda mainly from a 

 single tree which yielded 240 lbs. of dry 

 rubber in three years, have been planted 

 out on plots 14 and 15 at a distance of 

 20 x 20 feet. Members may be interested 

 to know that the same tree yielded 17 lbs. 

 of dry rubber in February. This is 

 believed to constitute a record up to 

 date, although the yield for April is 

 expected to be still greater. 



The Oastilloa, Ceara and other Manihot 

 rubbers are not being'tapped. 



Green Manures.— New plots of 

 Oajanus indicus, Tephrosia purpurea, 

 lndigofera anil, I. hirsuta, Soy beans and 

 Orotalaria incana have been established, 



Piots of 1/100 acre recently cut have 

 yielded as follows : — 



Leucaona glauca No. 1 ... 156 lbs. 



do „ 2 ... 83 „ 

 Tephrosia Candida ... 191 „ 



Maize.— Seed of Hickory King has been 

 selected from the last crop and will 

 shortly be planted. It is proposed tc try 

 ear-row selection on an acre of ground. 



A tenth of an acre has been sown with 

 various crosses. 



Paddy. — The main crop is ready for 

 harvesting and is suffering from the wet 



weather. The lateness of the crop is due 

 to the difficulty of obtaining Sinhalese 

 labour at the proper season. 



Plots sown with specially selected seed 

 have been harvested with the following 

 results : — 



Plot 123450789 10 

 Yield per 



sq. foot 22 19 30 25 22 21 15 31 17 11 

 The last 4 plots were small. 



Plot 3 from the best plant of the pre- 

 vious generation yielded at the rate of 

 60 bushels par acre though planted at 

 12" x "12", a distance wnich has been shown 

 to be too great for the maximum yield. 



Miscellaneous.— The yams obtained 

 from Messrs. J. P. Abraham & Bros., 

 Heneratgoda, which were planted out 

 in November, have just sprouted after 

 a lapse of five months. 



The ginger has been an entire failure. 



Four varieties of sugar cane have been 

 planted out in plot 17 at a distance of 

 6 feet apart. 



The present village labour turn out 

 is 30 to 40 per cent, short, due largely to 

 its being the harvesting season. 



The fruit plots are doing well. 



R. H LOOK. 



NEW RUBBER EXPERIMENTS. 



Average 



Total Rubber. per Tree. 

 Jan. Feb. Mar. Jan. Feb. Mar. 

 82 C. Single V cuts started June 1911, alternate days 2915 1720 2040 73 43 51 

 87 A. North way serrated knife ; alternate days ...1265 975 865 50-6 39 34-6 

 87 B. Quarters daily ; alternate months ... ...3480 ... 2634 139-2 ... 105-3 



87 C. Full herring bone do do ... ... 3170 ... 2667 126-8 ... 106-7 



87 D. do do do alternate days ... ... 1850 1735 1739 74 69-4 69 5 



87 E. Quarters; alternate days ... ...1720 1505 1535 68-8 60-2 61*4 



Full herring bone. Total for 3 months ll'lOl grammes... 24*4 lbs. from 50 trees. 



Quarters do 10-874 do ...23-9,, from 50 trees. 



Alternate days ; average per month 1-681 do 



Daily ; alternate months do 1-490 do 



Suggestions. 

 Tapping 6 cuts 1 foot apart once a week 



3 cuts 2 feet apart twice a week and once a week. 

 2 cuts 3 feet apart thrice a week. 

 1 cut six times a week. 



68 



