Islands Agriculture Up-to-date

mission, to confer with other executives.

Islands Agriculture Up-to-date THE following information and suggestions are offered for the guidance of planters and gardeners:

Vegetable Seeds

If little black ants run away with seeds before germination rub the seeds in your hand with a little kerosene before sowing.

Mauritius Beans

Two years ago, I warned Island growers in these columns of the possibility of not finding a market for this product. My own entire crop lay in Cairns for a year before a buyer came along and the price was very unsatisfactory.

On enquiry, I now discover that Torres Strait Mauritius Beans are selling at 16/per bushel, much less than the 1933 price, which has not been reached since, and the prospects for Island growers are not very good, as substitutes are becoming more popular. The chief of these is Giant Cow Pea, which fetches a high price—but this plant may not thrive in the tropics.

Castor Oil

A hand machine for seeding and winnowing this product is now obtainable in London at a reasonable price, and is being tried on a plantation in Papua. Without mechanical aid of this sort, it is impossible to market satisfactorily the Castor Seed, as natural de-husking in the sun is not effective.

PEANUTS There appears to be some confusion in parts of Australia about permitting peaputs to enter the country.

Recently, I proposed to ship a small consignment into a minor Australian port, but cancelled it on the advice of the Customs Department, who informed me that an embargo on oversea nuts was in existence. On referring the matter to Canberra, word came that peanuts from Papua would be admitted duty free, so, Island Planter, if you feel inclined to tackle the Australian market, there is nothing in Customs regulations to stop you.

There is another side to the question, however. I took my samples to Sydney, where a business friend commented favourably on their size and flavour. He submitted them to a crushing factory, which declined them on the grounds that, like all Islands nuts, they were mouldy.

As no mould could be seen, my friend and I compounded by referring to it as “Invisible Mould”; so allow for this in your calculations.

Avocado Pear

Reference to a recent work on tropical agriculture indicates that a great future lies before this little-known fruit, and the author appears to think that before long it will almost rival the banana in popularity and mass sales.

A tree is now fruiting on the Tambourine Mountains, in South Queensland, so there should be no difficulty in growing it in the Islands. But transport will, as usual, probably be the chief difficulty in marketing.

At present the fruit seems to be rarely offered for sale in Sydney; but, in view of the fact that a much discussed lady of the English press needs one for breakfast every morning, a greater demand may arise.

My authority states that the tree grows equally well in clay or sand, and at high or low elevations. A curious feature of the tree is that its flowers are male in the morning and female in the afternoon, or vice versa, and a judicious mixing of the two varieties must be made. This phenomenon is referred to as “Sex Reversal”; and even Kraft-Ebing has not reported a human being with the same propensities.

KAPOK Anyone interested in the difference between the price the planter gets and what the consumer pays should study the market price of kapok, which will be found in the back pages of this magazine.

Information about kapok growing appears to be lacking, and anyone embarking on its culture in Australasian tropics has to learn its idiosyncrasies by personal experience, and not from books. Certainly I have never struck anyone in Papua who really knew anything about it.

The tree appears to be particular in its choice of soil and it certainly requires a lot of moisture. As so many villages in Papua have a few specimens growing nearby, would-be growers might learn a lot by travelling round and observing in what sort of soil the best bearing trees are growing, with a view to obtaining similar conditions for their own plantation.

This is the latest thing I have heard about kapok: A young relative of mine in Australia, whose husband is a sheep-farmer in a district where nothing but sheep are ever considered, was told that the writer was ‘Going in for kapok.” Quite innocently, she remarked, “Why, has Uncle So-and-So