April, 1909. J 



331 



EDIBLE PRODUCTS. 



TEA CULTURE IN NATAL. 



By Claude A. Lowe. 



The Tea Industry of Natal is ot com- 

 paratively recent growth, having, like 

 that of Ceylon, followed and supplanted 

 the growing of coffee, when the latter 

 industry was rendered unprofitable by 

 the introduction of a blight which 

 destroyed the berry. 



The first plants were introduced by 

 Mr. — now Sir — James Leige Hulett from 

 Assam, the difficulty of transporting the 

 seed alive being got over by planting 

 them in boxes of soil, which were care- 

 fully tended during the voyage, so that 

 when the ship arrived many plants were 

 already over six inches in height. Un- 

 fortunately for the start of the industry, 

 this arrival was followed by an extended 

 period of drought, and as those among 

 whom the plants were distributed were 

 not all equally interested in the new 

 venture, a very large percentage of them 

 died out before the end of the first 

 season. The remainder, however, are 

 alive to-day, and share, with their intro- 

 ducer, the honour of being the parents 

 of one of the most profitable and flourish- 

 ing industries of the " Garden Colony." 



While in some degree the practice of 

 growth and manufacture in Natal is of 

 necessity more or less similar to that of 

 India, yet in many points of procedure 

 it is radically different ; and the manager 

 of a large estate in Assam or the Dooars 

 might well be pardoned if at first sight 

 he condemned the entire outfit as impos- 

 sible- The Natal planters, however, 

 deprecate, and with considerable reason, 

 any comparison between their methods 

 and those of India, since the climate, 

 soil, rainfall and other conditions are 

 entirely different. 



The writer only recently had an oppor- 

 tunity of visiting the two large neigh- 

 bouring estates of Clifton and Kearsney, 

 owned, respectively, by Messrs. W. R. 

 Hindson and Co., Ltd., and Messrs, J. L. 

 Hulett and Sons, Ltd., both of Durban, 

 Natal, and was given by the manager of 

 the latter full information and practical 

 demonstration of the procedure. On 

 the Kearsney Estates, which occupy 

 some two thousand acres actually 

 planted up, the tea is planted on sloping 

 ground or on the hillsides, which are in 

 no part very steep, no particular forma- 

 tion being observed, though the bushes 

 are planted at regular intervals. The 

 planting varies, some being four by four, 

 other divisions four by five, but the tea 

 is not measured off into sections, nor are 



intervening paths of any sort allowed 

 for. The whole " field,' as each division 

 is called, may cover anything from 100 

 to 500 acres or more, according to the 

 soil available, the name being justified 

 by the first impression it gives of a well 

 grassed meadow. 



Cultivation, 

 The first thing one naturally asks 

 when he sees this young turf is, '' How 

 often do you cultivate ? " but it is a 

 little startling to be told that if they 

 get round once and a half in the year 

 they consider they are doing rather well. 

 Then one discovers that the manager is 

 patting himself on the back for his 

 superior management, when he ladles, 

 out the information that he works his 

 garden with one coolie to four acres, as 

 against your one per acre. The fallacy 

 lies of course in the fact that, as all the 

 pruning, and practically all the cultiva- 

 tion is done in the off season, all hands 

 are available all the time for plucking ; 

 with the result that the men — unlike 

 their brothers in India, who are all 

 thumbs at plucking— become more expert 

 than the women. 



The Kearsney manager was clearly in- 

 credulous when the writer mentioned 

 6 to 8 hoeings a year as fair and ordinary 

 cultivation, but it is very evident that 

 the same practice in Natal would never 

 do. In the first place the rainfall rarely 

 exceeds 42 inches, and is often much less, 

 so that such constant cultivation would 

 inevitably mean the drying up of the 

 soil, withering of the surface roots, and 

 failing of the leaves ; and a tea bush 

 without leaves is a little worse than 

 "Hamlet without the Prince." 



Then, again, it is doubtful if any of 

 the hills would pay to terrace, and as 

 even the limited rainfall has a way of 

 coming in bulky sections, constant 

 cnltivation would mean denudation. A 

 certain amount of hoe and hand weeding 

 is done, but only when absolutely neces- 

 sary, as the weeds do not grow with the 

 speed and luxuriance seen in India, and 

 practically never so as to hide or choke 

 the bushes. On the other hand, it should 

 be noted that when cultivating, the 

 whole estate is well and deeply manured, 

 at least once in two years. 



Plucking. 

 The plucking is done by all hands, and 

 follows very closely the best Indian 

 practice. One, however, misses the fami- 

 liar basket, as in its place they use 

 sacks, ju9t plain ordinary sacks, and at 

 weighing-in time these come in tied up 



