Fibres, 



202 



[September, 1910. 



are beinning to clear off their bush. This 

 work should be pushed ou as much as 

 possible, or otherwise the rubber will 

 most probably suffer and expenses at a 

 late date, when the bush will have to be 

 cleared off, will be greatly increased. 



Biliary Fever and Trypan Blau. 

 The Agricultural Department of Cam- 

 bridge University, which has already 

 made for itself a wonderful reputation 

 in a short space of time, seems to have 

 accomplished another triumph, this time 

 in Veterinary Science, Professor Nuttall, 

 working in conjunction with Dr, Had- 

 wen of the Health of Animals Branch, 

 Department of Agriculture, Canada, has 

 discovered what promises to be an in- 

 valuable remedy for the disastrous 

 disease known as biliary fever of dogs 

 (canine piroplasmosis). This complaint, 

 which is a veritable scourge in the 

 Cape Peninsula and along the coastal 

 area of Cape Colony and for some dis- 

 tance inland, has proved quite amenable 

 to injections of " trypan blau," a recently 

 discovered dye of the benzidine group, 

 and the result of the experiments con- 

 ducted in South Africa and published in 

 the Agricultural Journal of the Cape o,f 

 Good Hope are quite startling to read. 

 Dogs normally doomed to die from the 

 tick-carried disease recovered in a few 

 days after a single injection of the drug, 

 the dye seeming to act as a specific 

 poison to the piroplasmata. The only 

 ill-effect to the dog would appear to be a 

 certain amount of local irritation and 

 (occasionally) swelling at the seat of the 

 puncture, and the staining blue of the 

 animal. But even a blue dog is better 

 than a dead one, and as the colouring 

 wears off in time this would not appear 

 to be any disadvantage. It is hoped 

 that the dye will prove efficacious as a 

 curative for certain other diseases of 

 animals, such as " red water fever "of 

 cattle. Experiments in this direction are 

 already in progress, and the results will 

 be watched with interest. Already the 

 mild English form of "red water" has 

 been indicated as amenable to the treat- 

 ment, but a local trial on the Onderneem- 

 ing bull (which has been suffering from 

 an obscure form of continued fever 

 possibly caused by trypanosomes in the 

 blood-stream) gave no definite result. 

 In fact the bull eventually succumbed to 

 the fever, which was not definitely 

 diagnosed and seemed to baffle all 

 the local talent. 



Rubber Seedlings. 

 One cannot help noticing the many 

 turns and twists (abnormalities) that 

 young plants of Hevea brasiliensis dis- 

 play. The frequence of 'knee-bends' 



and ' complete circles ' in the seedlings 

 raised at the Botanic Gardens last year 

 had attracted attention, when a pam- 

 phlet issued by Mr. Petch, of the Botani- 

 cal Department of Ceylon, dealing with 

 this very subject, was received. Mr. 

 Petch showedhow these " abnormalities" 

 arose, and how far the method of plant- 

 ing the seed was responsible for them. 

 The Para rubber seed is a slightly 

 flattened ellipsoid, being rather larger 

 at one eud than at the other. One of 

 the broad faces is slightly rounded and 

 may be called the upper side, while the 

 lower side is grooved down the middle. 

 Along this groove lies an adherent strand 

 which ends in a small depressed area. 

 At the other eud is the micropyle, 

 which is easily seen by the thin covering 

 over the hole where the young root 

 comes through when the seed germinates. 

 A number of seeds were sown in different 

 ways to ascertain what proportion of 

 'twisted' seedlings resulted, and in- 

 cidentally some information was gained- 

 of importance to planters in this colony 

 who are raising their own rubber seed- 

 lings—as to the method which is likely 

 to give the most satisfactory results. 

 The experiments were similar to those 

 of Mr. Petch in Ceylon, and 1,000 seeds 

 were sown in each of the following 

 ways : — 



(a) Horizontally, with the lower side 

 downwards — germination oo'l %. 



(b) Horizontally, with the lower side 

 uppermost— germination 63 %. 



(c) Horizontally, on the narrow sides, 



65 %. 



(d) Vertically, with micropylar end 

 downwards, 64*4 %. 



(e) Vertically, with micropylar end 

 uppermost, 54'7 %. 



It will be noticed that the germination 

 results were very similar in all the 

 different methods tried, but considering 

 the growth of seedlings afterwards it 

 may be generally accepted that the 

 sowing of the seeds horizontally with 

 the lower side dowuwards is likely 

 to give the most satisfactory results. 

 Those seeds which were sown vertically 

 with the micropylar end downwards 

 were largely shot out above ground 

 when germination had taken place, while 

 those which were sown vertically with 

 the micropylar end uppermost have 

 shown, as was noted in Ceylon, a large 

 proportion of seedlings with ' knee- 

 bends' and with twists. These will be 

 briefly discussed in the next number of 

 the Journal. 



