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In Ceylon most planting now being done 
Planting in Avenues, is in avenues twenty feet wide, the trees 
being fifteen feet apart. They are planted 
so that the avenues run east and west. This gives the sun a 
chance to shine on the soil. In Malaya most planting is now 
being done 12 by 24 or 148 to the acre. Some planting is being 
done 15 by 30 or 96 per acre. One plantation I visited was plant- 
ing in equilateral triangles, the trees being iJ l / 2 feet apart or 160 
per acre, as against planting in rectangles 17^2x17^2, which would 
give only 140 per acre. 
Most plantations weed clean. This is very expensive and there 
are some plantations that weed only in rows while 
Weeding, others weed still less. I saw on one of the best pay- 
ing estates, a field of two year old trees growing in a 
lalang patch where they had had only weeded the lalang around 
each tree. These trees were doing very well. On a great mam- 
plantations the weeds are easily cleaned out after the burn and 
by keeping them down at first the expense of weeding is not 
great. Such land cannot be compared with our land where we 
have Hilo grass to contend with. In Ceylon the older men prefer 
clean weeding, but green manuring is coming in vogue rapidly. 
In places where the land is low and swampy it is drained so 
that there will be no standing water around the trees. 
Draining. Where the trees are planted on the hill sides drains 
are dug at intervals to prevent the water carrying 
away the top soil. 
There is no cultivation as a rule beyond hoeing the weeds as 
the soil does not pack and consequently does not 
Cultivating, need to be loosened. Photo No. 6 shows trees two 
years and seven months old, planted in a field which 
w T as "chunkeled" (hoed) to a depth of from six to nine inches 
before being planted. The trees show a more than average growth, 
several of the trees being 20 inches in circumference three feet 
from the ground. This photo also shows how the land is drained. 
Hevea grows in two forms, one more bushy than the other. 
Planters in Ceylon and Malaya prefer a tree fairly branched. 
There is a great deal of thumb nail prunning to make the trees 
branch at the height desired. This also has a tendency to make the 
tree large at the base. If a tree branches at 10 or 15 feet from 
the ground it is about right. Planters who have "topped" their 
trees state that it results in two large branches forming which is 
apt to split the trifnk where the two branches meet, if the wind 
is strong. The more leaf area a tree has the better and the quicker 
will the "bark respond." Photos Xos. 7 and 8 show Hevea trees 
that have had plenty of room in which to grow and have branched 
naturally, while Photo No. 9 shows trees that have been prevented 
