10 



HORDEUM VULGARE. 



Mixtures. 



Soils and manuring. 



Tillage and sowing. 



Irrigation. 



Weeding. 



Harvesting. 

 Diseases and injuries. 



ing kharif season, especially if this crop was unraanured. Hence barley or barley-gram 

 (bejhra) is the usual rabi accompaniment of indigo in the kharif, being held better able 

 than wheat to provide itself with nourishment from a soil which has not been allowed 

 to recuperate itself by even a six months' fallow. 



It is less frequently grown alone than sown mixed with either gram and peas (when 

 it is termed bejhra) or with wheat {gojai), and the area under barley alone, barley-gram 

 and barley-wheat stands in about the relative proportion of 15, 22 and 10. Eape {Bras- 

 sica campestris), mustard {Brassica jmicea), and the small oilseed known as dudn or iara 

 {^Eruca saliva), are commonly sown in barley fields either in parallel lines some 15 feet 

 apart or as a border. Dudn is especially common in unirrigated fields. Linseed is also 

 occasionally grown as a border. 



The soils on which barley is principally grown are light and sandy, and, as a rule, 

 are not highly manured. The character of its cultivation depends in great measure on 

 the second crop with which it is associated. If this crop be wheat, the conditions of 

 cultivation may be considered as similar to those of wheat, but if it be gram or peas, 

 the mixture is generally grown on the outlying fields of a village where manure and 

 irrigation (except in Canal Districts) are but sparsely applied. This mixture is the 

 typical rabi crop for unirrigated light land throughout the Provinces. 



The methods of ploughing and sowing are similar to those followed for wheat. The 

 number of ploughings is largest in Kohilkhand (where it is reported to be often as high 

 as 12), and smallest in Bundelkhand where two or three are held sufficient. As a rule, 

 barley does not require its seed-bed so finely pulverized as is necessary for wheat, and is 

 satisfied therefore with a less number of ploughings. Taking the Provinces as a whole, 

 probably four ploughings before sowing will be a safe average. Sowing takes place in 

 October, a little later than for gram, but earlier than for wheat, and is, as a rule, effected 

 by dropping the seed behind the plough either direct from the hand or down a bamboo 

 tube fastened to the plough stilt. The amount of seed sown per acre is from 100 to 

 120 lbs. Should the September rains have failed, and the ground be too dry for proper 

 germination, the land is, if possible, watered and ploughed before being sown, but this 

 seldom occurs to barley fields, since the eff'orts of cultivators at such a season are mostly 

 concentrated on their wheat. 



Irrigation when given at all is generally lighter than with wheat, and one or two 

 waterings are, as a rule, held sufficient. In Districts which enjoy a tolerable certainty 

 of winter rains, such as those of the Meerut and Rohilkhand Divisions, it is but rarely 

 irrigated at all. Prom the Table given further on, it will be seen that the irrigated 

 area comprises about half of that under barley alone, and f ths of that under barley- 

 wheat and barley-gram. 



Barley fields are very seldom weeded, nor is the practice of topping an over-leafy 

 crop, which is said to be common in the Punjab, reported from any District of these 

 Provinces. 



Cutting, threshing and cleaning are conducted exactly as in the case of wheat. 



The most striking of the diseases to v/hich barley is liable is that commonly known 

 as Jcandioa, which is the result of the attack of a fungus closely allied to that which 

 causes "smut" in English corn-fields. The first symptoms of the disease is distortion 



