1 Ave., 1902. ] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 121 
June, 1901, page 439, which is bad enough, but also by denuding a young plant 
of leaves, knocking off the young crop or spike by rubbing primaries together, 
and even, if severe, by breaking trees down entirely. 
The staking of coffee is generally only necessary during that period of the 
estate’s growth before the trees cover the ground sufficiently to prevent the 
wind getting through, under, or between them, and, in short, until they are 
sturdy enough to withstand wind and to protect each other. 
As soon as a young plant puts on enough leaves to offer any resistance it 
will begin to be affected by wind, if there is any, and it is then that the proper 
staking of the trees should be looked to. In this work, as in most, there is a 
right way and a wrong way of doing it, or rather, perhaps, methods whereby 
greater effect can be obtained, at possibly less cost or trouble, than by other 
methods, and about which very varied opinions are held. : 
When a plant is quite young, and even possibly during the first year of its 
life in the field, the lining peg, if properly put in, gives it sufficient support. 
This is generally put in, if the land is on a slope, close to, but above, the plant 
and sloped slightly towards it to serve the double purpose of preventing the 
covering up of the plant and steadying it in windy weather. (See article on 
“Planting, &e.,” Queensland Agricultural Journal, May, 1901, page374.) If on 
level land it is put in on the windward side upright and quite close to the stem. 
Until a plant is at least 18 inches high, it will not be necessary to tie it, 
but when ties are used at this age of the plant they should be of soft material 
—fibre or bark, &c.—and tied in the form of the figure 8, the stem of the 
plant occupying one loop and the stake the other, so that rubbing and chafing 
is prevented, and the expansion of the bole, which is fairly rapid just then, is 
in no way hindered. From one and a-half to two years old, and from then 
often until three years old, the trees will require longer and stronger stakes, as 
they present so much larger a surface of resistance to wind and are not yet 
sturdy or self-protecting. Especially will this be necessary if the field has 
grown at all rapidly, and become thin or spindly. The trees will now be 33 feet 
to 4 feet high, and perhaps even be already topped at 43 feet, as is the tree in 
the illustration, which is eighteen months old in the field. 
The old style of staking coffee as shown in Figs. 1 and 2 is not to be 
recommended, for it will be obvious that the greater amount of leverage is 
obtained on the tree by the wind at the top. and not near the ground. This will 
be forcibly demonstrated with a small flag on a stick on a windy day, when the 
ease with which it can be held steady while the hand is at the top of the stick is 
in great contrast to the amount of strength that is required if the stick is held 
at the ground end. In this old style the stakes have to be particulary strong 
and very firmly tied. This tieing has to be done so tightly, to be of any use 
at all, as to often ringbark and kill the tree, and is also frequently breaking and 
having to be retied. I have seen galvanised iron tie-wire thus used, even when 
double, snapped in a gust of wind, when a thread of cotton would almost have 
held the tree steady if tied in the right place. It will be seen then that, the 
roots of the tree being firmly fixed in the ground, it is the top of the tree that 
must be held to keep the whole firm rather than the middle or lower parts of 
the stem. Short stakes therefore are of comparatively little use, and are, 
moreover, difficult to drive in sufficiently firmly without also damaging the 
tree. 
Stakes to be of use must be at least as high as the tree after being firmly 
driven into the ground. ‘To be firm they will have to be at least a foot in the 
ground, and, if wet or specially soft ground, some 18 inches. These posts must 
therefore be 5 feet or so in length, should be about 2 inches in diameter, but 
need not necessarily be of hardwood, for unless the weather is positively 
cyclonic the strain on them will not be great. Nor need they be barked ; it is 
often better for the coffee-tree, in case of any friction, for the bark to be on 
the stake, and in any case split stakes are to be deprecated on account of the 
roughness and unavoidable edges and corners that scrape and rub the bark off 
the coffee branches. 
