July, 1911.] 



29 



Edible: Products. 



Irrigation and Drainage. 



Trenches. — The water channels should 

 be close to the suckers when first planted, 

 but when the plants are well established 

 the channels should be made in the 

 centre of the rows, for if the water is 

 applied close to the base of the stem, it 

 encourages the production and growth of 

 suckers, and in this way unnecessarily 

 weakens the plant. 



Drainage. — Perfect drainage is abso- 

 lutely necessary for bananas. It is even 

 more important to elaborate a system 

 of drains for an irrigation district than 

 to provide water canals, for more harm 

 is done by having too much water than 

 too little. But drains are equally im- 

 portant on clay soils or subsoils when 

 the water is supplied by the natural 

 rainfall. On ground where there is not 

 much fall, the drains naturally follow 

 the slope. But on hill-sides they should 

 be made across the slope with only just 

 sufficient fall to carry oil' the water ; 

 if there are natural gullies the drains 

 are led into them. In making drains it 

 is a great mistake to make them too 

 shallow from motives of economy. 



Cultivation after Planting. 



Various opinions are held by banana 

 planters about ploughing. Some who 

 have planted in light, loamy soils have 

 been reaping excellent crops for some 

 years without any ploughing. Others, 

 with heavy soil,ploughevery eight weeks 

 with a 6-inch plough, alternately one 

 way and across. Others again plough 

 only once a year. On heavy soils in wet 

 districts the plough has been abandoned 

 in favour of the fork to get advantage. 



A planter who is establishing a cocoa 

 walk with bananas — before planting — 

 ploughs, cross-ploughs, harrows, and, 

 when necessary, trenches, afterwards he 

 ploughs with a small plough (with moon- 

 coulter attached) three to six times a 

 year. On banana lines, where a plough 

 cannot work, he forks occasionally and 

 hoes frequently. He says that the 

 plough is far more effectual in breaking 

 up the soil than any other implement he 

 has tried, and it keeps the land clean 

 much longer. The plough works from 

 4 to 6 inches deep, and the cultivator 2 

 to 3 inches. Another planter forks once 

 a year, and uses the cultivator to keep 

 the weeds down. When the grass is too 

 high for the cultivator he uses hoes, and 

 only substitutes the plough for the hoe 

 or cultivator when labour is scarce. 

 Both plough and cultivator are kept to 

 two inches in depth in order to avoid 

 destroying roots. 



A planter of wide experience writes 

 as follows I do.not think that plough- 



ing close to the banana and cutting 

 thrcugh the roots does any harm. On 

 the contrary, I am certain it does good, 

 principally I think because the cutting 

 gives fresh impetus to the roots, and 

 this activity increases the growth of the 

 plant." 



Where ploughing is not the practice, 

 the fork is used to great advantage 

 when the young suckers are two months 

 old. 



Where the rains are constant, and the 

 soil heavy, the cutlass is the best tool 

 in weeding. The hoe and the Assam 

 fork and the cultivator are tools used 

 under different conditions. The disc- 

 harrow is an admirable instrumenc, 

 and should be in constant use so long 

 as the soil is sufficiently dry. If the 

 ordinary plough forms a pan, a subsoil 

 plough is used occasionally to secure 

 good drainage. 



Treatment op Suckers. 



Reason for Pruning. — Pruning away 

 such suckers as are not intended to yield 

 fruit is a most necessary and important 

 operation. It should be done when the 

 sucker is not more than one or two feet 

 high. The larger the sucker grows, the 

 more food material it abstracts from the 

 parent bulb, and the more its young 

 roots interfere with the root system of 

 the plant, in both ways injuring the 

 future bunch. 



Method.— Care should be taken when 

 cutting away the suckers to apply the 

 cutlass, so that it does not point towards 

 the plant, otherwise it is very easy to 

 injure it. If the sucker is not cut away 

 quite down to the white bard part, it 

 will soon spring again, therefore time 

 and labour are saved by doing it 

 thoroughly at first. 



Choosing and Timing. — Suckers shoot 

 from the newly-planted bulb from eyes 

 all round, and sometimes from the 

 centre. Some planters cut away the 

 central sucker ; others leave it, as it 

 gives a fair bunch if the bulb is vigorous. 

 On the south side, in irrigated land, two 

 or three suckers may be left at equal dis- 

 tances round the bulb. It is well to take 

 those that start from eyes placed low 

 down, so that the roots have a good 

 hold on the ground. One sucker takes 

 the lead, as a rule, and becomes the 

 plant, fruiting in ten to fourteen 

 months ; another comes in as a second 

 sucker, giving a finer bunch four or five 

 months later. Occasionally all the suck- 

 ers will bear at the same time when 

 the bunches will not be so fine. It is the 

 practice with some planters on the north 

 side after planting in March and April 

 for fruit in February or March to prune 



