July 2, 1888.] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
'3 
COCONUT PLANTING IN THIS "WESTERN 
PROVINCE. 
OEYLONBSR AND CVEKFUL CULTIVATION — TRENCHING AND 
DRAINING ON COCONUT ESTATES 
Siyane Korale, April 1888. 
A healthy sign of the times is that more atten- 
tion is being pair! to agriculture now than a year or 
two back, and by the sons of the soil. This is un- 
doubtedly a step in advance. Hitherto the sole aim 
of wealthy Oeylonese has been to become possessed 
of laud to satiate an earth hunger, and to boast of 
owning so maDy acres of land. Cultivation was a word 
with a very vague meaning in their vocabulary, and 
seldom comprised more than weeding the land once 
a year. We seem to be on the eve of a revolution, and 
landholders are beginning to realize that cultiva- 
tion means more than keeping down the native jungle, 
and includes the returning to the soil the elements 
of fertility removed by crops. The habits of the coco- 
nut tree are to a great extent responsible for this 
neglect of the first principles of agriculture. Speak 
of crop drawing on the latent elements of fertility in a 
soil and of impoverishing it in time, unless the con- 
stituents removed from it are returned in the form 
of manure. "Why the fact that there are properties 
in existence of a hundred years old, that are bear- 
ing now as they did fifty years ago without the aid 
of fertilizers, say our friends, goes to disprove the 
teachings of science. They generalize from individual 
and exceptional experience. Ours io essentially an 
agricultural country whose prosperity depends mainly 
on agriculture. It, therefore, behoves those in autho- 
rity to make agriculture one of the principal sub- 
jects of study in all our public schools. In this utili- 
tarian age, when we are begiuning to place a £ e. d- 
value on education, and doubts are being raised of 
the utility of a knowledge of the classics and the 
higher branches of mathematics for those treading 
the humbler walks of life, and the universal cry 
beems to be for " teohnical'' education, agriculture will 
not come amiss in the curriculum of studies, and will 
possess a money value if it does nothing more than 
induce a love of gardening. A full and liberal supply of 
vegetables for the table will lessen the household expenses 
aud the druggist's bill A long-felt want is a course of po- 
pular lectures on useful subjects by the different talented 
men in our midst, in some central public building, and 
on Saturday afternoons when all public offices are closed 
early. 
To return to my subject, it is regrettable to find that 
trenching, a necessary branch of agriculture iu coconut 
cultivation, and which is intended to take the same 
placo as draining iu upland cultivation, receives but 
scant attention at the hands of coconut planters. For 
trenching to lie of any use, it must be taken in hand as 
soon after the land is burnt off as possible. The con- 
servation of the valuable surface soil and ashes was 
considered of so much importance in coffee cultivation, 
that the veteran Mr. George AVall propounded a plau 
of his own to lose as little of it as possible, by draining 
laud when the forest was standing. Old and experienced 
planters vetoed it as impracticable, but to prove its 
practicability, one of bis superintendents, Herbert 
Tucker, I think it was, did actually drain land before it 
wns felled. It is beyond my purpose to discuss the 
system. I mentioned it only to show the importance 
attached to the conservation of the surface soil and 
ashes. In coconut cultivation trenching is resorted to 
only after the trees have reached maturity. A case 
of closing the stable door after the steed had escaped. 
()n an old aud well-grassed coconut estate, there is no 
wash except iu the hollows where the water from the 
surrounding land finds an outlet. In the first few years 
after a plantation has been opened, the soil is con- 
stantly disturbed and prepared for minor cultivation. 
It is then that all the surface soil is displaced by the 
DMnioon rains, and finds a resting-place oither in the 
hollows on the estate or in your neighbour's paddy- 
fields. To prevent this sad and irreparable loss, trench- 
ing ought to be undertaken as soon after the burning 
ig possible. 
There is one essential difference between draining as 
it ii practised upoountry and trenoliipg on coconut 
plantations. By the former system all the rain that 
falls on the land is caught in drains of easy gradient 
and led on to ravines. With the steep hill-sides in our 
mountain country, this is the only practicable system, 
for any attempt to catch the rain water aud confine 
it in trenches to gradually percolate through the soil, 
will result in huge landslips, and the gradual subsi- 
dence of the hill-sides in the neighbouring valleys. But all 
the same one great objection to the system is that by 
directing the water that falls over a large surface 
to ravines, these with every heavy fall of rain get 
wid»r and deeper till in time they become unsightly 
and encroach on the cultivated land. In trenching 
a coconut estate, it is sought to catch all the water 
that falls on it so as to allow it to gradually per- 
colate through the soil. No cultivated tree requires 
so large a quantity of water for its successful growth 
as coconut, and the advantages arising o .t of storing 
in the soil large quantities of water for use when 
no rain falls are obvious. 
Let me now discuss the systems in vogue amongst 
coconut planters. Trenches of varying depth and 
width, according to individual idiosyncracies, aro cut 
continuously "between rows of coconut trees. Seme 
planters throw the soil so displaced on the upper side 
of the trenches, others on the lower side. One of the 
first things that struck me when I took to coconut 
planting was that there was a manifest disadvantage 
in continuous trenches. The water caught iu these 
naturally gravitated towards the lowest points in them, 
and then found an outlet carrying everything before 
it to be for ever lost to the estate. They did not 
in my opinion answer their purpose either as catch- 
waters or silt-traps, except to a small extent, 
To overcome my objections to these continuous 
trenches, I left a portion of them uncut between every 
two trees. This gave them more the appearance 
of water-holes than of trenches. By this system 
only the overflow of these water-holes or sections of 
a trench found an exit at every sensible depression ; 
and the overflowing was dependant both on the 
capacity of the trenches and on the fall of rain. The 
system was not perfect, but was an improvement 
on the practice in vogue. Further consideration 
satisfied me that no system of trenching will be 
perfect, or will answer the purpose for which it is in- 
tended, unless trenches are traced level following the 
contour of the land. The exorbitant price of a 
tracer stood in the way of my carrying out my 
idea for a long while. At' last it struck me that I 
might devise a " level " by inverting the triangular 
level {mattanlalla) in use amongst carpenters, and 
fixing it on to a staff and taking " shots " at the 
usual staff in use with a tracer. The work of my 
invention was approximate, but it answered my purpose 
admirably. I traced contour trenches, not continuous, 
with it in a field of coconuts at intervals of from 5 to 7 
trees, and they caught all the water of the late N.-E. 
monsoon, heavy aud long-continued though the rains 
were, without a single breach. 
I am averse to deep trenches except in very stiff 
soils, for they drain away all the moisture from the 
land, and the water that is caught in them sinks 
beyond the reach of the roots. I usually cut shallow 
trenches about a foot deep and six feet wide, aud 
throw the soil on the lower side of the trenches. By 
throwing the soil on the lower side of the treuohes, 
their capacity as catch-waters are increased ; by 
their being shallow, the water they catch does not 
sink beyond the reaoh of the roots, nor is the soil 
drained of moisture too much during the dry season ; 
and by having them wide the surface extent exposed to 
the beneficial intiueuce of the air is increased. These 
are the reasons for my system. I suppose those who 
adopt other systems have as cogent reasons to support 
them. 
^_ 
CHINA V. INDIAN TEA. 
In commenting on the great struggle of China 
vtrsus Indian tea, we have more than once 
referred to the great advantage whioh Indian 
tea planters possets iu the large areas which 
