December, 1908.] 



541 



Edible Products. 



acquainted last year put out posturas 

 directly from his own seed beds side 

 by side with posturas brought from 

 the mountains. These were all put out 

 at the same time and given the same 

 treatment. His home grown posturas 

 made a crop ten days ahead of the 

 others. We have obtained still more 

 striking results by combining increased 

 care with which posturas were moved 

 with careful seed and postura selection. 

 Instead of pulling the posturas as is 

 universally done, they were removed 

 with the entire root mass and the dirt 

 attached. This can only be done to ad-, 

 vantage in a transplanted bed, where all 

 the plants are properly spaced. After the 

 posturas have been properly hardened 

 off for a few days and are ready to move, 

 the operator inserts two fingers deep 

 into the soil between the plants, and re- 

 moves the postura by a lateral aud not 

 a vertical motion, and banks the 

 plants, roots, dirt aud all into shallow 

 light wooden trays about 18 inches 

 wide by three feet long and three inches 

 deep, and these covered by a piece of 

 old sacking are delivered by boys to the 

 planters as rapidly as they can be used 

 and not more so. The posturas can be 

 taken out of the beds about as rapidly 

 in this way as in any other. They are 

 set in the same trenches ordinarily used, 

 and watered. Very early the following 

 morning these plants will be found 

 standing erect and crisp, and the same 

 ground should then be gone over by men 

 with hoes and soil drawn around the 

 plants. The posturas from transplanted 

 beds 3C to 35 days old will be amply 

 large enough to permit of this. The 

 wetted soil about the plants will then 

 have no time to sun-bake, the plants 

 will not be left at the bottom of a ditch, 

 the victims of any heavy rain, and more- 

 over, these posturas tvill not lose any 

 time by *' durmiendo." Commonly, in 

 Cuban Vegas, a week or sometimes more 

 is practically lost in the "durmiendo " — 

 a wilted condition which lasts until some 

 new roots are put forth. And if a very 

 heavy rain should happen to follow the 

 planting the losses are commonly very 

 great. We have personally known of 

 there being above 50 % in loss from 

 plants dying and being flooded. Last 

 season in well-managed vegas in this 

 vicinity, operated under the old system, 

 it required 78 days to make a crop in the 

 open fields and 80 days under cheese 

 cloth, whereas by the modifications we 

 have suggested, aud the use of large 

 fine posturas direct from the trans- 

 planted beds, as large and as fine tobacco 

 was made in 45 to 50 days, and this not 

 only in one plot, but in many plots, and 

 with many different varieties, and where 

 all the world might see it. 



Again, we will grant that it is possible 

 even with very badly abused posturas, 

 to make a good crop if water and ferti- 

 lizer and labour and time enough are con- 

 sumed. But is it a good business pro- 

 position when by bettering the posturas 

 and the method of handling, and follow- 

 ing a system that will insure nearly 

 continuous growth, we can get just as 

 good a crop and in some respects better, 

 with two-thirds the same amount of 

 water, labour, fertilizer, and time. We 

 have proven the possibility of producing 

 a crop — seed to ripe leaves— in from 75 

 to 85 days. 



Thousands upon thousands of dollars 

 are simply wasted upon every crop of 

 tobacco grown in the great majority of 

 Cuban vegas by use of poor seed, poor 

 posturas, and improper handling. Each 

 year our demonstrations have shown 

 this most clearly. Aud yet there is 

 small service to the mass of the planters 

 by redemonstratiug this each year at 

 the Estacion. It should be demonstrated 

 also at convenient points throughout 

 the tobacco region, where all the world 

 may become acquainted with this same 

 train of facts that have been borne in so 

 strongly upon us here. 



QUALITY IN TEA. 



What Constitutes it. 

 The basis of all quality is fine young 

 leaf, the finer and younger the better 

 It is not sufficient to pluck a bud and 

 two leaves, but the bud and two leaves 

 must be plucked before young ; that 

 is to say, the shoot must be plucked 

 before the bud has reached that stage 

 of finality from which it will cease 

 to develop further, and become sterile 

 or banjy. When it is decided to leave 

 two mature leaves and the germinal 

 leaf, it should be carefully ascertained, 

 to command quality, that of the bud 

 and two leaves remaining, the bud is 

 not sterile. The careful examination of 

 leaf plucked from an advanced flush 

 will clearly show what is here meant. 

 The system known as plucking black 

 where feasible ensures good leaf. 



Plucking. 



How frequently is the remark heard 

 •' What, not plucking ! and you seem 

 full of leaf ! " and how often the reply 

 comes what you saw is not due to be 

 plucked till Monday or Tuesday, as the 

 case may be. It cannot be too strongly 

 impressed that leaf should wait for 

 nothing, but should be plucked irrespec- 

 tive of dates the moment it answers 

 specific conditions. These are points 

 beyond comment, which careful experi- 



