JUL^ 1, 1898.1 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
5 
been destroyed before the ginger has been planted. 
If the weeds are pulled or the ground disturbed 
while the plant is growing, water is apt to settle 
round the root, and this rots thorn. The reed-like 
ginger plant, with its leafy stems, grows sometimes 
to a height of five feet; its cone-topped flowering 
stems reach from 6 to 12 inches, and, in a well- 
cleaned field, make a pretty show when in their 
September bloom. On wet soil and during very 
rainy seasons the root i"? subject to what is termed 
"black rotten." This is a rotting induced by warm, 
soggy soil. The root swells in spots, fills with water, 
turns black, and emits an offensive ocler. In this condi. 
tion it is attacked by inseciR and worms, which has 
given rice to the belief among the planters that the 
rotting is caused by a so-called ginger worm. (It is 
possibly a fungus disease.) 
Growing ginger must be well watered. Irrigation is 
practised to a limited extent, but in most of the 
parishes this is unnecessary, as the rainfall is abun- 
dant. Fertilization, though highly important, is 
rarely attempted, partly owing to the small profit, 
but largely owing to the customs of the country. 
The most that is ever done is to plough m the 
■weeds and cover the ground with banana trash. 
Barely will the planter ever gather up the manure 
from his live stock and throw it on the ginger-bed. 
There are no stables used in Ja.maica, tlierefore 
no such thing us a compost heap. Sea weeds and 
watering the beds with sea water have been tried, 
experimentally with good results ; but uo matter how 
large-sized roots or how tine a quality would be 
yielded, the average planter would not take the 
trouble to work his ground in a scientific manner. 
An all important feature is the rapid impoverish- 
ment of the soil that follows the ginger culture. 
One planter told me that only ferns would grow on 
the soil after exhaustion by this crop. There is 
thus a constant demand for virgin soil to secure the 
best-paying crops. This is attained by sending valu- 
able timber up in smoke, as one authority tersely 
expressed it. " Dried-up streams, general barrenness 
in fact a wilderness marks the progress of ginger 
culture." 
The situation is clearly summed up by Mr. Wm- 
Fawcett, Director of Public Gardens for Jamaica, 
from whose report to the Honorable Colonial Secre- 
tary I quote: " The soil which produces the very 
highest quality ginger, realizing, perhaps, £10 per 
cwt. in the Loudon iMarkets, is the very deep black 
soil of virgin forest. To grow ginger under this 
condition involves the destruction of large areas of 
forest. Magnificent trees, six feet in diameter, may 
be seen in some districts lying rotting on the 
ground, while the ginger cultivators have gone further 
to the centre of the island, abmdoning the wood 
lands Already cut down. The plan adopted in deal- 
ing a forest is for a cultivator to invite ten or 
twelve of his friends to a 'cutting match." He 
provides food and drink, and the laborious work of 
felling tree is carried on merrily and without much 
"xpense. Afterwards, fire is put and the place is 
burnt over. This burning is considered very im- 
portant, as much so as the virgin soil. 
"Probably its importance is due principally to 
the deposit of potash and other mineral matters 
contained in the ashe.=, but the fire will also sweeten 
the ground, correcting sourness; and moreover, it 
destroys insect pest^. Some cultivators will only 
grow ginger in freshly cleared woodland, and next 
year they move on to a new clearing ; but although 
in this way they get very fine ginger, it is at the 
expense of forest land which would require a heavy 
outlay a-'d perhaps a term of 100 yeais to restore. 
Albert Town was not long ago k great centre for 
thii cultivation, but I was told there tiiat growers 
had alres.dy got as far as It miles further inland. 
"Ginger oau be, and i.s, grown iu many pl?.ces 
year after year on the same ground. An intelligent 
cultivator at Borbridge stated that, he knew of ginger 
growing for forty years in the same patch. S.inford 
Town is in a German colony, and one of the original 
colonists, Soraers, an active old man of eighty years 
of age, has been cultivating ginger and arrowroot 
there since his youth. He and the other colonists 
have been in the; habit of planting a small patch 
one year, leaving it to ratoon as long as it was 
profitable, then throwing it up or growing other plants 
until, after a term of years, they again plant the 
same patch with ginger. This is an irregular rotation 
of crops ; 'plant ginger,' the product of planting, is 
of better quality than the ratoons, and the ratoons 
in each succeeding year are inferior. When the 
ground is too poor to grow ' white ginger,' the blue 
ginger" the inferior variety, can be grown, ''More 
depends upon the curing of ginger, considering the 
crop as a livelihood, than soil. I believe that the 
badly-cured ginger brought sometimes to the market 
is due to wet weather, rather than to want of care." 
" The export of ginger is, on the whole, on the in- 
crease, but if this is accompanied by the gradual 
destruction of woods and forests, it is not a subject 
of congi .itnlation." An examination of the exhausted 
soil revealed the fact that it mas defi'uent in 
organic matter, lime, phosphoric acid and soda. 
Attempts made, at my suggestion, to supply these 
deficiencies by the use of market fertilizers of various 
kinds were not productive of any favourable results. 
Stable manure alone resulted iu a failure, as like- 
wise did the use of a bat guano found on the island. 
The use of a marl, expecially when mixed with stable 
manure, was a partial success 
The Jamaica Agricultural Society, in 1895, began 
a series of practical experiments which are still in 
progres. Their first results gathered in February, 
1897, were somewhat affected by a drought in the 
previous November. Upon a limited area of worn- 
out land, which in check experiment gave no return, 
they secured a crop which would be equivalent to 
over 2,500 pounds of cured per acre, and the pro- 
duct was of extraordinary size and quality. The 
fertilizer aiding in bringing this result was a mix- 
ture of marl with a compound fertilizer made up 
of about 10 per cent, each of soluble phosphates 
ammonia and potash -salts. These results were very 
encouraging and the Society has extended them by 
securing larger plots, giving aid to planters in the 
way of furnishing fertilizer, etc, returns fiom which 
will be gathered in the spring of 1898. 
The solution of the problem of reclaiming land ex- 
hausted by the ginger and other crops, and the 
prevention of the further wasteful destruction of 
valuable soil, is in Ginger Land one of great moment. 
There is in this fair Island thousands upon thou- 
sands of acres of abandoned land, lying within easy 
reach of roads and ports ; much of it has been ah in- 
doned because the soil has been exhausted by ginger 
or coffee. If by suitable tillage and manures it can 
be reclaimed, great benifits to the inhabitants will 
follow. 
Giiigr-r, as wa know ic, is the root-stalk of the 
plant. The root proper or root fibres are about rt 
inch long, not very numerous, dying off as the rhizome 
advances and leaving a slight scar. As regularly 
shaped hands, with more or less straight fiagers. 
command the higher price in markets, experiments were 
made to secure a regular shaped growth. Owing to the 
peculiarities of the native planter, instructions were not 
close' V followed and the results were imsucce sful. 
The fact was developed that a sprout starts from 
the parent eye, and from this stem iuturn, lateral 
shoo'^s Or branches develop in pairs. These sirie 
bra'-ches again develop in pairs, these pairs generally 
alt3rnating uo opposite sides. It was found iliat if 
the soil was well worked and pulverized before planting 
the growth was straighter than when pUnted in 
hard'^'soil. Some difference was noted also in llie 
ondition of the parent ]5lant; if this was well de- 
veloped and vigorous the resulant root-stalk was i f 
a better type than where the parent was small, 
knarly and crooked. The Botanical D=parimeut is 
now expeiimenting with selected plants. 
Gathering the Oiny. r Ci ui>. 
Ratoon ginger is gatnered from March to December, 
but planted ginger is not ready for digging until 
December or January, and from then until March 
