372 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. |Dec. 1, 1899. 
COFFEE IN QUEENSLAND. 
THE LATKST REPORTS. 
Experiments with coffee growing have been made 
from tim-} to time -often at long intervals — ever since 
the foundation of the colony. Thirty years ago the 
then Government tried to galvanise the industry into 
life by offering growers special concessions, but though 
Bmall plantations were laid at Buderim, near Mary- 
torough and other places, no one seems to have 
persisted in the cultivation either earnestly or ex- 
tensively. One gentleman, near Mackay, has con- 
tinuously grown a few acres of it for over 20 years, 
at time with very handsome results. Daring the past 
few years a wider interest has been taken in coffee 
culture. On the Russell River, near Cairns, Mr. W. 
B. Lewis has established the Mount Graham plan- 
tation. Some 16 years ago he visited Mackay and 
was much impressed with what he saw on the plan- 
tation of Mr. Costello (the gentleman first referred 
to); he decided to give coffee growing in his own 
district a thorough test. The result has been a com- 
plete success. He has now 15 acres under crop, and 
the Mount Graham coffee is to-day a well-established 
commercial commodity, finding a ready sale locally 
at a remunerative price. In the Cairns district there 
are now 400 acres planted as against 159 of the pre- 
vious year, and 50 of the year before. At Kamer- 
nnga, a few miles from Cairns, at the foot of the 
coast range, there is a State nursery where may 
varieties of the tree have been carefully cultivated 
for years. To show how the industry is spreading, 
it may bo mentioned that from the nursery during 
the year 1894, 110 lb. of coffee seed were distributed 
fttnong 72 intending growers, while in 1896,116 farmers 
received 1,3001b. Besides this the nursery in the same 
time sent out 2,250 coffee plants.jall the samples ofco ffee 
crown from them being of excellent quality. The pro- 
cress of Cairns is best illustrated bv the coffee output, 
which rose from 16,962 lb. in 1897 to 40,678 lb. in 
1898, the majority of the trees bearing then for the 
first 'time. Three years ago planting at Mackay was, 
began on the largest scale yet attempted in Qaeensland. 
The Mackay coffee Estate Company commenced oper- 
ations, and has now some 100,000 trees planted. 
Altogether at Mackay there are now 115 acres under 
crop which will begin to show returns this year. 
The 'old trees which had been bearing for years have 
been replaced with young plants. That coffee of a 
very superior quality can be grown at Mackay has 
been abundantly proved, as, apart from Mr. Cos- 
tello's experience, for years past coffee trees at the 
Mackay State Nursery have borne crops which old 
and experienced planters, who have spent years in 
Ceylon, India, the West Indies, and Brazil, have 
publicly declared they never saw excelled consider- 
ing the age of the trees. Another feature of the 
trees grown in North Queensland, which is main- 
tained by experts to prove beyond all doubt the 
Buper excellence of the local conditions— temper- 
ature, soil, rainfall, &c.— is that they will bear full 
crops in their fourth year, whereas in other coffee- 
growing countries a full crop rarely appears until 
the tree matures, and that is, attains its full growth 
in its sixth or seventh year. It is affirmed that its 
early fecundity is neither detrimental to the quality 
of the coffee nor the subsequent life of the tree. 
North of the tropic line is generally considered the 
natural home of the coffee plant, but experience has 
ehown that it can be cultivated much further south 
with almost equal success. In the neighbourhood of 
Maryborough, there are now about 300 acres planted; 
and the success which has attended its cultivation 
at Buderim Mountain has induced selectors on the 
Jilackall iiapge to pat in some trees. 
Experiments there have shown that the climate and 
soil at certain altitudes are very favourable to their 
propagation. Recognising the importance of this 
growing industry, and the great scope the northern 
portions of the colony afford for its expiusion, the 
department has procured the services of Mr. Howard 
Newport to instruct the planters new to the industry 
in the best method of planting, curing. &c. Mr. 
Newport has had 11 years' experience in India, where 
he managed a large plantation at Melrose, Yercand, 
in the presidency of Madras. He has also had con- 
siderable experience of coffee-planting in Ceylon 
Mr. Newport corroborates the testimony of Indian 
and Ceylon planters as to the eminently favourable cli- 
matic conditions of North Qaeensland for coffee 
culture, and he biings Queenslanders the cheering 
news that, though the industry is yet only a very 
small affair in the colony, the most flattering reports 
have gjne abroad respecting the quality of the coffee 
and the big field there is in North Queensland for the 
expansion of the industry. He says that planters in 
India have begun to look upon Queensland as a 
dangerous rival in the production of the finest-grade 
coffee, of which they at present are the largest pro- 
ducers in the world, and practically have the mono- 
poly of that class of trade. 
" Will coffee-growing pay ?" is a question frequently 
asked. It is answered always in the affirmative by 
practical growers. What it will pay depends, as in 
all other industries, upon how economically it is 
worked, the quality of the article produced, and 
the market prices. It is only to be expected that 
where there have been so many isolated amateur 
efforts under so many different conditions there 
should be considerable diversity of opinion on a good 
many points. On one point all are, however, un- 
animous — that good coffee can be grown in Qeens- 
land, and that good yields can be confidently anti- 
cipated. What it will cost to grow is a matter that 
has not been settled definitely in such a way as to 
be capable of general application. It is generally 
admitted that it can be grown in a small way more 
profitably than on a large scale, where the question 
of labour enters largely into the consideration when 
the crop is ready for harvesting. So far, the areas 
harvested have been small, and the labour employed 
of different kinds. Whilst one man employed abori- 
ginal labour, which is naturally cheap, others got 
through the whole of the berry picking with the help 
of their families. A child of about 12 years, it is 
said, can pick 25 per cent, more in a day than a 
man. But all men have not large families of young 
children, nor can aboriginal labour everywhere be 
found, and it is asserted that white adult labour 
would be too expensive for the work performed. 
In Inda, Brazil, Ceylon, and other coffee-growing 
countries there is abundance of cheap native 
labour. It is contended that if Queensland is to 
compete successfully with them the labour employed 
must also be cheap, so that it would seem that the 
labour of the Queensland coffee plantions of the 
future nill have to be obtained, as in the case of the 
sugar plantations, from the Polynesian Islands. The 
experience of the Mackay Coffee Company during 
the next and following seasons should furnsih a good 
guide as to whether the coloured labourer is as use- 
ful and essential among the coffee trees as he is 
among the sugarcane. But whatever may be the profit 
in operations on a large ocale, there is no doubt of 
eoffee being " a poor man's crop." It is an easy one to 
grow. Mr. Newport and other experienced planters 
state that any man of ordinai-y intelligence can easily 
and quickly learn all that is necessary to plant and 
tend the trees, pick the crop, and cure it ready for 
the market. It requires no heavy labour, nor any 
very expensive mills and machinery. It keeps in- 
definitely, and to a certain extent improves with age. 
In one of a series of letters contributed to the 
" Queensland Agricultural Journal " on coffee culti- 
vation, the manager of the Mackay Coffee Estate, 
an ex-Indian planter of very considerable experience, 
wrote as follows : — '' The requisites necessary for the 
preparation of the product of the mill are so simple 
