192 



The Supplement to the Tropical Agriculturist 



or eight weeks in duration. In a good season 

 California produces about 4,500 tons of honey. 

 Much of this is the famous mountain sage 

 honey, which is water-white, and is said to be 

 the mildest flavoured honey in the world. In 

 the northern part of California bees gather 

 their stores from the bloom of the carpet grass 

 and the eucalyptus ; in the central countries 

 from alpalpa and orange blooms, white, black, 

 and purple sage, rosa amoria, sumac, and wild 

 buck wheat. The last two give a poor grade of 

 sweet, which is usually extracted to be used for 

 winter feeding, or, these later stores are left to 

 the hives, if the blooming season comes when 

 the combs are full. The method of honey ex- 

 tracting, as described by Mr Consul-General 

 Hearn, is interesting. Details vary in different 

 apiaries, but in one called the Model Apiary, 

 the process is as follows :— 



With a hand-ear, or small truck, the apiarist stop< be- 

 side a laden hive ; this hive is two stories, sometimes 

 three. With a thin-bladed knife he loosens one edge of 

 the lid, and thrusts the mouth of the smoker beneath it. 

 With quick pressure of the bellows he sends the smoke into 

 the chamber, and the bees hurry below to avoid suffocation. 

 He lifts the combs, and brushes away the stupefied bees. 

 If the honey is capped over, cr partially so, he puts the 

 comb into wooden-handled baskets made for the purpose, 

 and when he has a load the car is pushed to the extracting 

 house, to which it runs on a miniature railway, which runs 

 its cars through every street of the bee city. Well filled 

 comb-hives weigh 8 to 12 lb, according to thickness of the 

 comb, and specific gravity of the honey. Inside the ex- 

 tracting house, is a deep, tin-lined, uncapping box occupy- 

 ing nearly the whole side of the room, and in this box the 

 frames ate suspended until wanted. Uncapping is largely 

 done by women. The frame, containing the comb, is 

 balanced on one edge of the uncapping box, and a long 

 knife dexterously slices off a thin sheet of wax, thus 

 destroying the cell seals. As the combs are uncapped they 

 are placed in the baskets of the contractor, which are 

 reversible, and the honey is thrown out by centrifugal 

 force. From the bottom of the extractor runs a 3-inch 

 pipe on a gentle incline to a tank outside the extracting 

 house. This tank holds several thousand pounds. Across 

 the opening of the pipe where it leaves the extractor is 

 fastened a section of wire netting with rather coarse 

 meshes to keep pieces of comb or refuse from passing into 

 it. In the top of the receiving-tank is suspended a white 

 flannel bag, 2 feet in length, in the upper part of which is 

 run an iron hoop some 1 foot 3 inches in diameter, which 

 first tits the opening, in the tank ; this further strains the 

 honey. The honey is then drawn into tin cans,holdingfrom 12 

 to BO lb each.— Journal of the Hot/al Society of Arts, June 26. 



PLANTERS AND SCIENTIFIC ADVICE. 



Planters will read with regret that Mr R L 

 Proudlock has resigned his post as Curator of the 

 Gardens and Parks on the Nilgiris. for he has 

 ever been on the look out for anything new in the 

 plant world likely to prove valuable to India. 

 To lend a helping hand to the planting com- 

 munity in this Presidency, however, seems to 

 be no recommendation with the powers that 

 be. Dr. Lehmann's service have been dispensed 

 with by the Mysore Government and Mr Proud- 

 lock no longer, apparently, finds his billet 

 worth retaining. Planters in South India, 

 however, have so few scientific friends com- 

 pared with their confreres in other countries 

 that they can ill afford to lose them. A most 

 interesting feature in Mr Proudlock's Annual 

 Reports has been his record of the progress of his 



EXPERIMENTS WITH VARIOUS SPECIES OF RUBBER; 



it is to be hoped that he will find time to 

 publish further details regarding these before 

 he goos. He has been especially successful, 

 I hear, in solving the tapping difficulty with 

 Ceara rubber. At any rate his trees of this 



variety at Kullar, shows signs ot having 

 been heavily tapped, look perfectly healthy in 

 spite of it. The secret of Mr Proudlock's success 

 in this direction is, I believe, that he has 

 abstained from stripping off the outer bark of 

 the tree, its natural protection against insect 

 and fungoid enemies. 



This seems to be a period of transition of 

 scientists interested in the plauting industry 

 generally. Beside the foregoing, I have had to 

 chronicle within the past year or so resignations 

 by Mr Stanley L Arden from the service of the 

 Government of the Straits Settlements; by Dr. 

 Mann from that of the Indian Tea Association; 

 and by Mr Herbert Wright from Ceylon. 



Georuos. 



— M. Mail, July 13. 



THE COCONUT PALM DISEASE IN 

 COCHIN. 



And the Improvement of Agricultcre. 



H.H. the Rajah of Cochin has ordered to be 

 published in the Cochin Gazette the following 

 Proclamation regarding the precautions to be 

 taken in the State to prevent the importation 

 of the Coconut palm disease : — ■ 



Whereas it has been brought to Our notice that an in- 

 fectious disease of a peculiar nature affecting coconut, 

 areca and other palm trees is prevalent in the adjoining 

 territory of Travancore, and whereas it is expedient to 

 take effective precautionary measures against the possible 

 importation of the disease into Our State, it is hereby de- 

 clared that no living coconut seedlings, or roots of coco- 

 nut, areca, or other palm trees, or soil in which such roots 

 are mixed up, shall be imported into Our State from the 

 Travancore territory, until the said territory is declared 

 by competent expert authority to be free from such disease, 

 and that such articles will be contraband in the Cochin 

 State. 



We are further pleased to authorise Our Dewan to issue 

 such orders as he may deem necessary to give full effect 

 to this Our Proclamation, and also to declare that any 

 person that may violate this Proclamation shall, on con- 

 viction by a Magistrate not below the rank of a second 

 class Magistrate, be liable to a tine not exceeding R50. 



The same issue of the Gazette also contains a 

 long Memorandum by the Dewan describing the 

 agricultural conditions in the state and indicat- 

 ing the general lines on which the improve- 

 ment of agriculture should proceed. In the 

 concluding paragraph the Dewan says : — 



The general policy that will be followed by the Govern- 

 ment in the matter of development of agriculture has been 

 laid down in the Dewan's Proceedings dated 5th October, 

 iy07, Kef: on U No. 79'83. Since then rules have been 

 issued to regulate the grant of loans from Sirkar funds for 

 improvement of agriculture and arrangements have been 

 made to open a Veterinary Dispensary at Trichur from the 

 beginning of 1081. A new Superintendent of Agriculture 

 has been appointed, and has begun to work. He has been 

 ordered to submit proposals for opening depots in the head 

 quarters of all the Taluqs for the exhibition of all kinds of 

 agricultural implements of the improved pattern and 

 for stocking a sufficient quantity of seod of the different 

 varieties of crop for sale. He has already begun to pub- 

 lish in the Village sheet of the Government Gazette, in 

 Malayalam, important and useful information relating 

 to agricultural matters. The proposal of the Government 

 to open model farms will be given effect to immediately 

 and arrangements have already been made for opening 

 an experimental and demonstration farm in the old Viy- 

 yoor ParK near Trichur. The improvement of irrigation 

 and drainage facilities will also be attended to by the Go- 

 vernment gradually as funds permit. The Government 

 cannot reasonably be expected to do very much more than 

 this, and it is the duty of all landholders themselves to 

 make strenuous endeavours, collectively and individually, 

 to improve the agriculture of the country and the Dewan 

 hopes that they will show some activity in the matter 

 through the Agricultural Association recently formed, the 

 representations of which will, at all times, receive the 

 Dewan's earnest attention.— U Maif July 15, 



