so many
advantages, it is the form I would recommend for adoption. The holes
should be at least six feet in diameter, and about four feet deep, and
when refilled the surface soil is to be used, and not that which is
taken out of the hole. Each hole should be filled up about one foot
higher than the surrounding ground, to allow for the settling of the
soil and the sinking of the tree, which, planted at this height, will
in a few years be found below the level. Over each hole thus filled
up, a shed, made of Attap leaves or other shelter, closed on two
sides, east and west, and proportioned to the size of the plant, is to
be erected. It is not a bad plan to leave an open space in the centre
of the top of each shed, about twelve inches wide, by which the young
plant can obtain the benefit of the dew and gentle rains, which more
than compensates for the few rays of sun that can only fall upon it
whilst that body is vertical. After the sheds have been completed,
each hole should have added to it a couple of baskets of well
decomposed manure, and an equal quantity of burned earth, when all is
ready for the reception of the plant, which, having been set out, if
the weather be dry will require watering for ten days or a fortnight
after, in fact until it takes the soil.
The planter having set out all his trees must not deem his labors
completed, they are only commencing. To arrive thus far is simple and
easy, but to patiently watch and tend the trees for ten years after,
requires all the enthusiasm already mentioned. About three months
after planting out, the young trees will receive great benefit if a
small quantity of liquid fish manure be given them. In the first six
years they ought to be trenched round three times, enlarging the
circle each time, the trenches being dug close to the extremities of
the roots, which generally correspond to the ends of the branches, and
each new trench commencing where the old one terminated. They must of
course greatly increase in size as the circle extends, requiring a
proportionate quantity of manure, but the depth ought never to be less
than two feet.
The object of trenching is to loosen the soil and permit the roots to
spread, otherwise the tree spindles instead of becoming broad and
umbrageous. Manure is beyond all other considerations the most
important to the welfare of the estate; it is that which gives
quantity and quality of produce, and without it a plantation cannot be
carried
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