294 



The Supplement to the Tropical Agriculturist 



[Mr E R Wiggin is a valiant opponent of the 

 burying of prunings; but somehow he never 

 seems to carry us much further towards definite 

 information on the subject. No one will dispute 

 that the mere cutting of holes— involving the 

 aeration of the soil— is attended by a certain 

 amount of benefit ; but if our correspondent 

 means to suggest that the improved yields in 

 the fields mentioned by Mr Joseph Fraser is 

 simply due to the cutting of "rain catchers : '! — 

 we would be inclined to leave the suggestion 

 to be laughed out of court by all practical 

 planters. Mr Wiggin renounces all claim to be 

 taken seriously when he tries to account for 

 the rapid decay of the prunings in the low 

 country by stating that they are eaten up by 

 white ants!— Ed., CO.] 



THE BURIAL OF TEA PRUNINGS. 



Three further letters on this important contro- 

 versy appear hereafter. Mr E R Wiggin quotes 

 the authority of Dr. Mann to support the case 

 against burying ; but it is a qualified opinion. 

 Dr. Mann recommends the burning of prun- 

 ings it blights or pests are prevalent in the 

 estate. We may state his opinion : — 



"To leave prunings lying about in a garden 

 with these blights on them is suicidal, and to 

 bury them is dangerous. If the garden is, how- 

 ever, free from blight, there does not seem any 

 absolute reason against burying the light 

 prunings— and these only— provided the follow- 

 ing conditions are adhered to : — 



" (1) They must be buried deep. At least 6 in. 

 of soil should be left on top of them, so that 

 they will not be turned up by the hoe. 



" (2) They should be buried immediately on 

 pruning, or as soon after as possible. In 

 Ceylon, trenches are dug to receive the prunings 

 before the bushes are touched at all, and tho 

 prunings are put into them practically at once. 

 Once dried up, much of the manurial value has 

 gone or is rendered less valuable. 



"(3) They should be buried with something 

 which will destroy any latent germs or spores of 

 fungi which are upon them, The best materials 

 for this are lime and basic slag, which not only 

 cause the blight spores to be destroyed but 

 also the prunings to rot more quickly." 



But what says Mr Claud Bald in his 

 " Indian Tea : its Culture and Manufacture " ? 

 He believes in burying prunings, " which are 

 of great value as a manure, especially if buried 

 deeply and in a green state." He says : — 



"Valuable manurial properties have been 

 destroyed by burning the prunings, while, as 

 compared with other gardens where the 

 prunings have not been burnt, there has been 

 no apparent result in the direction of sub- 

 duing the pests. Theoretically the ashes are 

 distributed to form manure for the whole 

 ground ; in most instances, however, this is 

 mere theory, as the ashes of an acre of prunings 

 are usually distributed over but a few square 

 yards of land." 



With regard to Mr Wiggin's experience we note 

 quoted in a pamphlet entitled " The Fertilisation 

 of Tea" by George A Cowie, M.A.,B.Sc. which 

 reached us some days ago, the opinion of Mr W B 

 Jackson, for many years manager of the Haute- 

 yille Group of Estates, He commenced burying 



prunings iu 1894 and the estate has continued 

 doing so since, burying alternately with lime and 

 basic slag. " I know of no bad results,' 1 says Mr 

 Jackson, "from this practice ; but of many good 

 results ; and we are now as much in favour of 

 this plan as ever we were." This opinion must, 

 of course, have been given some time ago; but it 

 is important as showing that even upcountry, 

 with the exercise of judgment, prunings may be 

 advantageously buried. Mr James M B Duncan 

 writes an interesting and fair letter on the ques- 

 tion. He approaches the subject in the same 

 spirit as ourselves, viz., with an open mind and an 

 anxiety to learn all there is to be known pro and 

 con. Lastly we have an important letter from Mr 

 Petch himself, Mr Petch quotes figures to sup- 

 port his contention that the amount of nitrogen 

 in prunings is less than 4 to 4J per cent, as 

 stated by Mr Joseph Fraser. We can find no 

 independent authority on this point at present 

 but Mr Bald refers to prunings "as a manure 

 of great value." Mr Petch points out that he 

 has at present 1()9 estates on the root disease 

 list. It would be interesting to know how many 

 of these owe or attribute the disease to the 

 burying of prunings. Mr Petch also repudiates 

 the suggestion of prejudice. He is dealing with 

 the matter from the standpoint of the Mycolo- 

 gist and puts evidence forward that gives some 

 ground at any rate for his expressed fears. As 

 the evidence in the case stands at present, 

 however, we are inclined to think the practi- 

 cal tea planter will be more attracted to the 

 burying of prunings by the glamour of its good 

 results than repelled by the terrors of possible 

 root diseases. 



I. 



Lindula, March 2nd. 

 Sin,— I omitted to give the late Dr. Watt, 

 the expert of the Indian Government for tea. 

 He absolutely condemns the burying of prunings. 

 Let those laugh that win. I am content to rest 

 on my experience and results. The estate, I am 

 today writing from, has been systematically 

 rain-holed without that other cultivation and 

 the crop for 1908 was 578 lb. per acre in a ring 

 fence of made tea, : no mean result in a short 

 season. — Yours, &c, 



E. R. WIGGIN. 



II. 



Doragalla Group, Pussellawa, March let. 

 Dear Sir,— This subject having considerably 

 interested me for some years past— to the 

 extent of my making various little practical 

 experiments on my own beside doing a good deal 

 of burying prunings in the regular way during 

 the past nine years— I have read the recent letters 

 by Mr Petch and others with very much interest. 

 The pith of Mr Petch's letter appears to me to 

 be contained in this quotation from it: "There 

 is nothing to indicate that the same results 

 would not have been obtained if the prunings 

 had been omitted." I have this morning re- 

 turned from the examination of holes in a field 

 where prunings were buried with basic slag and 

 sulphate of potash a year ago last December. 

 The holes in all cases show a rich-looking dark 

 mould, full of rootlets, etc., while the woody 

 portions of the prunings have rotted away, 



