580 



The Supplement to the Tropical Agriculturist 



houses for the future. It is traversed by navi- 

 gable streams and rivers in great part; all 

 affluents of the Amazon. Of these waters 10,000 

 miles are navigable at all seasons of the year for 

 steamers of varying draught, whilst in the wet 

 season the totai available navigable waters in 

 rivers and streams, for steamers, launches, and 

 canoes, exceeds 20,000 miles, all in Peruvian 

 territory. 



The main product of this wild region at 

 present is lubber, of which the output is valued 

 at about \\ millions sterling per annum. In 

 the Peruvian montana there are very extensive 

 rubber- bearing forests, both in that part of the 

 Amazon plain drained by the affluents of the 

 Madre de Dios river, and, although less known 

 the region to the north drained by the Maranon 

 and Huallaga. The principal Peruvian rubber- 

 bearing trees are the Shiringa or Hevea, and 

 the Caucho. The Hevea is the superior kind, 

 and is that which has made Brazil famous as a 

 rubber producer. The tree requires a rich, deep 

 soil and abundant moisture, and at times grows 

 to great size. It lends itself to cultivation, 

 although not much has been done in Peru yet 

 in rubber-plautmg. Large areas of rubber- 

 bearing land have been taken up in Peru; prin- 

 cipally by Peruvians but partly by foreign com- 

 panies; though much land still remains un- 

 occupied. 



Discussion. 

 Mr H Hauiel Smith enquired about the nature 

 of the labour available, and whether any would 

 have to be imported, provided it was decided 

 to cultivate rubber in Peru. It would also be 

 of interest if information was forthcoming as 

 to whether the cost of the land would be an 

 important consideration in the question, and 

 whether the transport of the rubber when it 

 was grown would be a serious matter. Would 

 it be possible to bring the produce down to the 

 Pacific coast instead of, as at present, having to 

 make the long journey down the A mazon to the 

 Atlantic seaboard? Unless that were possible, it 

 would render the profitable cultivation of rub- 

 ber in Peru quite hopeless compared with the 

 Federated Malay States and Ceylon, where the 

 cost of transport was comparatively low. He 

 understood that the rubber grown in Peru was 

 of excellent quality, as it was in Bolivia, but the 

 danger and expense of cultivating it was very 

 great. 



Miss Webster thought the value of the paper 

 would be increased if the author could give some 

 particulars of the trees found in the forests. 

 Were there any timber trees ? 



Mr J B Carruthers asked the author for in- 

 formation respecting the proportion of Para 

 rubber trees in the natural jungle region he had 

 described as rubber-producing, and what were 

 the possibilities of extracting the rubber from 

 them, apart altogether from the question of 

 planting rubber. 



Mr Enock, in reply, said that labour in the 

 forest regions was rather scarce, and he believed 

 some of the rubber companies engaged there 

 had found that their main difficulty. Peru was 

 anxious to introduce Japanese labour, a good 

 deal of which was employed on the coast. The 

 uatural outlet of the rubber region was down 



the Amazon, because the rubber forests existed 

 on the tributaries of that river. It had, never- 

 theless, been found cheaper by some of the 

 companies working the rubber lands to bring 

 the rubber over the Andes and down the raiP 

 way to Mollendo. As soon as roads, perhaps 

 motor roads, and short lines of railways were 

 constructed on tho natural outlet down the 

 Amazon, he thought, there would be an enor- 

 mous development of trade. The Amazon forests 

 possessed the peculiarity that they were unlike 

 the otherforests of the world, which cousisted 

 very largely of one kind of tree. They consisted 

 of all kinds of trees, in fact, he believed it had 

 been calculated that in one square mile there 

 existed thousands of different kinds of trees, and 

 this rendered the Amazon forests perhaps of less 

 value than some of the other forests of the 

 world. If a particular kind of tree was re- 

 quired, it was sometimes necessary to hunt 

 about for it a good deal. There were, however, 

 great groves of what was termed cedar there, 

 although it was not a true cedar ; but it was a 

 valuable wood. Valuable hard woods also grew 

 in the forests. Tho question of the proportion 

 of rubber trees to other trees was hard to 

 answer. The rubber-bearing land was confined 

 to a certain zone of land upon tho margin of the 

 rivers which wore tributary to the Amazon ; but 

 it was impossible to state the exact proportion 

 it occupied of the total area. 



CULTIVATION OF A SANDY SOIL. 



Sandy soils are of various descriptions ran- 

 ging from those in which sand largely pre- 

 dominates to others which are of a sandy 

 loam, and, in consequence, highly desir- 

 able for the production of potatoes and many 

 other crops. The disadvantages of a sandy 

 soil are that it is deficient in lime, in sub- 

 stance, and in vegetable matter, while it is 

 often so porous that it fails to retain mois- 

 ture during the growing season, when, how- 

 ever liberal the farmer may be in the provision 

 of manure, especially of artificials, he fails to 

 obtain a paying crop. It is extremely difficult 

 to cultivate with profit sandy soils of many 

 classes, for the simple reason that they are 

 so subject to suffer in a droughty season. It 

 is true that much is saved by the ease with 

 which they are cultivated with the plough 

 and other implements, while they cau bo 

 cleaned at much lower rate than land of a 

 more substantial character. An owner or an 

 occupier of a sandy soil, if it is not too light 

 in character and will pay. for extra cultiva- 

 tion, will be well advised to improve it by the 

 addition of clay or marl, and especially by 

 the cultivation of crops which are rich in 

 nitrogen for the purpose of ploughing in. 



In Germany very large areas have been 

 improved so much ■ by persistent cultivation 

 that they have reached a substantial price, al- 

 though originally purchased at some 12s an acre. 

 Suppose that a commencement is to be made. 

 Something should be done in the way of mar- 

 ling, while potassic and phosphatio manures 

 may be supplied with some liberality for a 

 few years in succession in order to feed the 

 plants which are to be grown for ploughing 



