4
No. 350, REVENUE, 23RD JULY 1896.
have shade and protection provided for them. It has been found that the entire
coppicing of a plot often results in failure due to the absence of suitable protection for
the young shoots.
(b) Nedivattam.— A large quantity of dry bark, amounting to 94,600 lb., was
taken during the year from different varieties of cinchona trees growing on this
plantation. There is a great variation in the weight of bark yielded by the different
species ; for instance, the succirubra trees on the old plots yielded on an average 33 lb.
of green bark per tree, some large magnifolias 27½ lb., the officinalis 9½ lb., and some
young hybrid 2½l b . A n u m b e r o f t h e o l d e r s u c c i r u b r a a n d m a g n i f o l i a t r e e s w e r e
cut down, not so much for their bark, which does not perceptibly increase in value
after a certain age, but for their wood, of which a large stock is needed for fuel in the
factory. Over 8,000 renewals were put out during the year, and about 38,000
failures were restored in the younger portions of the estate.
(c)Pykara—(1) Hooker.—The young trees on this estate are doing very
well ; but some of the larger trees on the ridge have a sickly appearance. Some of
the trees that were coppiced in 1894, because of their dying condition, have thrown
out shoots ; but these appear to be unhealthy, and some have died out. The part of
the estate, where these trees have been growing, is in an exposed position, and the
soil is not of the best description. A belt of blue gums will be allowed to grow up
and form a shelter for this plot, and the land will be well manured before any serious
work is again undertaken here. Seven thousand seven hundred and fifty officinalis
plants were put out during the year.
(2) Wood.—In accordance with the suggestion of Dr. King, who inspected this
estate in July, and an order from Government (G.O., No. 5141, Revenue, dated 19th
December 1895), instructions were issued to abandon this estate. All the trees were
cut down and uprooted, and the bark was harvested before the end of the year. A fire
broke out in the estate in February and cleared the ground of the leaves and twigs of
cinchona, and thus made the work of abandonment complete. The number of trees
uprooted were 20,484 hybrids and 110 succirubras, and the amount of bark taken
from them was 130,025 lb. of green hybrid bark and 1,320 lb. of red bark.
IV. UPKEEP.—The buildings, roads, drains and bridges have been attended to.
At Dodabetta, an old bridle path has been made into a good cart road, so that the
lower portions of the estate can be easily manured. A large stone bund for conserv-
ing water for the nurseries has been completed at Pykara. The roof of the large
cattle shed is being repaired ; and the new lines for the coolies are being erected on
the Hooker estate. A substantial picnic house, in place of the old wooden hut, has
been built on that piece of the Wood Estate opposite the Lower Pykara Falls.
V. MANURE.—All the estates are well provided with manure. The Dodabetta
estate received 1,487 cart-loads from Ootacamund in addition to 300 loads from the
cattle sheds. Three hundred loads of manure were put out at Pykara and 100 loads
at Nedivattam. A ton of Trichinopoly phosphate in powder was last year applied to
the land where some of the young plants needed a tonic. The poverty of Nilgiri soil
in phosphoric acid has often been made the subject of remark, and the addition of
phosphatic manure to land planted up with cinchona is now regarded as necessary.
A few interesting experiments were made on some crown bark trees at Nedi-
vattam, which showed to what extent the bark is enriched by good cultivation. In
the year 1890 some five years old trees in plot 14 were manured and. trenched, and
a sample of the bark taken at the time gave 3.73 per cent. of sulphate of quinine.
This plot was dug all over in 1894 to a depth of 14 inches with a forked mamooty,
and a sample of bark was taken in November 1895, when the trees were ten years old,
and the sulphate of quinine was found to have risen to 6.83 per cent.
Again, in 1890, plot 21 was trenched and manured; the trees were eight years
old and their bark yielded 3.23 per cent, of sulphate of quinine. In 1894 the land
was subjected to deep digging, and in 1895 the bark from the trees analysed 6.68 per
cent. of sulphate. A sample of bark from plot 27 which had been treated in a similar
manner as plots 14 and 21 gave 5.22 per cent. of quinine, which is above the average
composition of crown barks.