698 
THE TKOPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[April 1, 1902. 
PLANTING NOTES. 
" TALGASWELA " AND THE WORKING OF A 
Tea Company s Estate. -Tlie letter we 
publish elsewliere t'lom "Critic" will oe 
usel'ul to others pursuing the same voca- 
tion as he. The gist of our correspond- 
ent's remarks is that the superintendent 
responsible for expenses shonld have full 
freedom of action in obtaining his 
materials, so that his responsibility should 
be in no way nominal— a fairly reasonable 
'^^BUDDING Oranges. -Some advance has been 
made in the proi. .gaii. n wf tlie nnp- rted kind*, of 
oran<res during tlie pn s.Mii yea;, and s Kiily ^ood 
stock of strung budded plintsiH now on hand 1 his 
it is trusted will do away with ihe fomplaiiit so 
frequently heard of orange* proving sour when 
raised from seed, a case <.f which occurred dmii,}< 
the present week. The stock used is that of the 
Seville oran"e which does not suffer in our climate 
from stem rot or Mai di-gouma, aj» do the best of 
our St. Michael's and Tangerine kinds. The 
" Washington Navel" is among the varieties suc- 
cessfully budded. These plants will, of course, be 
put on sale in the Nurseries as soon as a sutticient 
number are on hand to meet the demand. I 
leirn that in some instances the pupils who atten- 
ded the Agiicultural Lectures are meeting with 
f ur success in budding and grafting. -Trmdac^ 
BuUttin. 
Green Tea Prospkcts in Cktlon.— A 
planter of wide experience writes: — 
" The green tea itonusiiic ivquiies watching on 
the rai t of the ' Thirty ■Committee." So far as 
it iroes Messrs. Finlay, Muir & Co.'s agency for the 
American Green Tea Syndicate appears to adopt 
the metliod that will meet the requirements for 
the green tea bonus. Some rumour has got 
about tliat green tea is being used by the 
blenders in Colombo to mix with black, this 
green tea having received the bonus from the Ces.s. 
This may account for the exports of green tea no* 
tallying with what has been paid by the Planters 
Association on green tea invoices. The green tea 
factory is at work at Nawahipitiya. It is rumoured 
that they are purchasing 1,0001b. of leaf daily. 
The factory is supplied with excellent rollers and 
driers driven by an old machine, steam roller, 
supplied by a boiler, for steaming the leaf." 
Coconut Pi.anting in Fi.ji.— Mr. V. H. 
Tarte who left Ceylon this week (after nearly 
a morith s visit) on his return to Fiji, visited 
Goluapokuna Coconut Estate and saw there 
the typical methods of local cultivation, 
which he said offered a gre.it contrast with 
Fiii In Fiji, he said, practically nothing 
was' done in the way of manuring, artifi- 
cial or otherwise. The Fiji trees tapered to 
the top and did not bear such fine nuts 
perhaps as our finest— though their natural 
growth showed quite as well on the average. 
On learning the very little extra expense, 
Mr Tarte became determined to go m for 
manuring when he got back to Fiji and 
promised to inform us of the results. There 
was a thorou<?hlv adequate market, he tod 
us for all tlie coconuts (and copra, especially) 
that Fiji could produce— Messrs. Lever Br<is., 
t'or one instance, having secured practically 
all the crops they could contract for up-to- 
date, 
Kelani Tea Garden Co.— No dividend 
has been declared for the past year, but 
a substantial hahince lias been carried for- 
ward, and we think the shareholders have 
every reason to be very hopeful. 
Mr. R. V. Webster- is now. in all pro- 
bability. Visiting (Land) Agent for the Trans- 
vaal Government. His communication else- 
where gives infoi'ination of leading interest 
to Ceylon planters who m^y be looking 
towards South Africa. 
Fungus on Cacao. — We have received a 
monograpli on Dipioaia cacHoieola, P Heun. ; a 
parafitie Fungus on sugar cane and cacao in the 
West I die.f by Albeit Einvard, B 4.., A.E.C.S., 
F.L.S., Mycologist to the Imperial Department of 
Agriculturi* for the West Inilies, late scholar of 
St. JdIik's College Cambrids;e, with plati-s. 
Planting in Fiji.^ Ceylon planters will 
find further valuable information on 
planting in Fiji in our issue. Bannanas 
appear to be the simplest and least 
troublesome product ; cacao gives promise ; 
vanilla is abundant, but is scarcely taken 
seriously ; tea, we are glad to note, does 
not receive great attention, though there is 
little against i;, beyond "over-production"; 
and tobacco grows very well, requiring noth- 
ing but the opening of more land. This 
does not exhaust the list, but gives a fair 
selection. 
Planting in Java : Coffee, Cinchona, and 
Sugar. — In tire colonial repoit rece aly published, 
the Java Government bus stateil its views about: 
the coffee cultivation. The intention is to encour- 
age the free cultivation in the .-ame manner as 
was already done in the residencies Fassoeioean, 
Probolingo, and the Pieanger, namely, by allow- 
ing a restitution per bouw to be divided on the 
three first years of the coffee plantation, but with 
the necessary caution, and only on such estates as 
promise a proper production for a long time. As 
regards the compulsory cultivation and the delivery 
of ciiffee, there is only an unimportant increase 
to be observed in Tagal, Pekalongan, and Madioen 
during 1899 to 1900, Of the other 11 districts 
moip or less of a decrease is to be reported. The 
decrease in the leaf appeared in 1900 in all 
districts. Both in 1899 and 1900 the out turn of 
the Government's coffee crop remained under the 
estimate. The Government's cinchona cultivation 
has shown a satisfactory result owing to the 
advance < f prices. The quinine market at Batavia 
has exceeded the expectations in 1900 and for 1901 ; 
still better results were expected. Referring to 
the economical condition of the natives the report 
tjays the amounts paid to them by 137 sugar 
manufactories in 1900 amount to a total of more 
than 33.000,000 guilders, being about fl24l,000 on 
the average for each manufactory. In the mean- 
time a petition of the principal firms and com- 
panies at Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague, 
concerned in the Java sugar cultivation, has bnen 
sent to the Minister for the Colonies, asking for a 
temporary reluctinn of the railway freights for the 
article. Jiva sugar is again p.isaing through a 
serious cri.'^i-i. I'l 1900, 22 mannfaci.ories of the 
i' etherlands India Agricuhur d Company fetched 
a price of fl6.74 per picul without interest on 
shires and bonds bat includicg the expenses for 
the improvement of the manufacture. — L. and C. 
Express, Feb. 28. 
