858 Supplement to the "Tropical Agriculturist,*' [June 2, 1902. 
requisite for a good crcp of pea-nuts is good seed. 
In couiitries where the crop is grown ou com- 
mercial lines the selection of seed is a most im- 
portant matter. They are nil carefully shelled 
and hand-picked, ai>d only the plump, perfect ones 
with unbroken skins, being kept for sowing. If 
this matter is not carefully attended to, there will 
be a great many blank places in the field. A few 
years ago pea-nuts were planted by hand, but it 
was a very tedious and laborious process. Of late 
years, however, a siinple but efl^-ctive mechanical 
contrivance has been brought into use, which de- 
posits pea-nuts nt regular distances in the rows 
and covers them carefully over. With the aid of 
one of these machines a man can plant about 7 
acres per day. It is advisable to sow a Uw 
extra seeds in some portion of the field to provide 
plants for any blanks that may occur. It will 
iilso be necessary to keep a close watch on the 
field until the seedlings are well above ground, 
for many birds and small animals are so fond of 
pea-nuts that if the fields are unprotected theie 
would be many blanks to fill up. The young 
plants will begin to appear above ground in about 
ten days or a fortnight, according to the state of 
the weather. When the plants have appeared 
above ground they are a very pretty sight, and 
look very much like a lot of young red clover 
plants, as we see them in spring time in the old 
country. ... 
When the crop shows signs of ripening, the ports 
will turn brown. As soon as they have arrived 
at that stage they must be lifted, or they will get 
discoloured. If this should take place, their value 
as a commercial article wil be depreciated. If 
only a few rods of ground are under cultivation, 
the pea-nuts may be lifted with a fork, but where 
there are several acres the operation is best done 
with a plough. This should be run under each 
row, which will sever the main root of the plant, 
and will leave the plants and pods on the surface. 
After they have laid on the ground and become 
partly dried, they should be stacked in the field 
to complete the operation. This is usually done 
in the following way:— Select some stout stakes, 
about 8 feet high, sharpen one end, and drive 
them into the ground about 18 inches. See that 
they are left in a perfectly upright position, at 
right angles. Noil cross pieces of wood, about 
3 feet long, beginning at 2 feet from the bottom 
and continuing at every 2 feet until the top of the 
stake is reached. With a fork gafher up the 
plants, and put as many on each auke as it will 
comfortably hold, If showery v.eather should 
eii<--ue befor e i he pea-nuts are suflficisntly dry it 
will be advi 'alilo to put ii crtp ul h■^J m- !i!.i-;i\v on 
^•m:h sUke to tlirow the rain off. After tliny have 
become snffioi<^iitly dry, the pods may eitlier be 
picked off in the field or the stacks stor-d in a 
barn for the pods to be picked off ;it some future 
time. The picking is the most tedious process of 
nil, for it has to be done with hand labour. If an 
efficient but simple machine could be invented to 
strip off the Doda without injuring them it would 
not only ;faciliate getting the produce to market, 
Imt it would jjrove of inestimable value to farmers 
in si)arsely-populated districts, where it is often 
a difiiculiy to got labour of any kind to perform 
•what work there is to bo done. 
As many as 115 bushels of pea-nuts have been 
harvested from an acre. This, however, is an ex- 
ceptional case, and the average yield must be put 
down at a much lower figurs. About 25 or 30 
bushels are considered a fair crop. — Agricultural 
Gazette of N. S. Wales. 
SHADE FOR YOUNG TREES. 
To the Editor of the " Agricultural Maffazine." 
Dear Sib, — In a state of nature young trees 
grow for a considerable time under shade, and this 
fact would lead one to ask the question whether 
shade might not be advisedly supplied to cul- 
tivated trees such as the coconut during the 
early stages of growth — shade for roots os 
well as foliage. This might be considered 
rather a fantastic idea by many, but it may 
be worth looking into. 
In the young stage the parts of the tree — 
stem, leaves and roots — are in a more or less 
immature and tender condition, at least they 
have not become " hardened " with increased 
vigour to the extent that trees of some age 
have done. Under such circumstances some 
means of protection against the effects of ex- 
treme or varying temperatures may be admitted 
to be likely to act beneficially. Some fast grow- 
ing tree of the leguminous order (as likely 
to add fertilty to the soil) such as the Ery- 
thrinai would naturally be thought of in this 
connection, if remunerative catch-crops (such as 
cassava in Ceylon or plantain — the favourite 
shade tree of the West Indies) are to be discarded 
as likely to impoverish the soil and as pro- 
viding insufficiently high and yet broken shade. 
In very dry situations shade during the early 
years of growth, as preserving the soil mois- 
ture and protecting the foliage, would enable 
the plants to make an earlier start and more 
rapid growth than if no shade were provided. 
I have heard of a case where coconuts failed 
to grow till the lantana scrub was provided, 
when they came up and flourished into a 
valuable plantation. 
Bare land exposed to a fierce tropical sun 
is hardly the best condition of soil for young 
growing plants. Just now much attention is 
being paid to mulching which is highly recom- 
mended by competent authorities in coffee cul- 
tivation. In the case of the coconut it is only 
reasonable to expect some protection for the soil 
and the roots that in t'le early stages have 
not penetrated to any extent into the lower 
moisture-holding strata. 
Weeds, small and great, are generally looked 
upc.il as robbers of the soil, but that can only 
ba when they are allowed to flourish and are 
then pulled up and conveyed off the land. 
In the case of short-lived delicate plants such 
as are grown in market gardens the utilization 
of weeds to any advantage is impracticable, 
but this is not the case in the pormanent 
cultivation of large trees. Here weeds cannot 
retard the growth of the crop to an appreci- 
able extent — if at all — while there would be 
no loss (rather gain) of fertility, provided that 
they were not carried off the land. The only 
