The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-09-20

The financial outlook for the Hilo
Railroad Company has greatly improv-
ed during the past year or two, and IN
some particulars greatly within the
past few months, and those interested
in it seem to have good right to take
a very optimistic view. Planting on
the Puma cane lands, which was prac-
tieally given up four years ago, when
the plantation went into the hands of
a receiver, has been recommended dur
ing the past two years. The abandoned
cane lands have been leased and are
now all practically under cultivation
again. with the cane contracted to be
hauled by the Hilo railroad to the Olaa
mill. Puma, too, has now become the
site of considerable pineapple and rub
Der experimentation by concerns which
have sufficient means to give conditions
thorough trial, and while these have
not vet added large volume to the
traffic of the road. they have added
some. and give promise of great deal
more.
ohia Tie Contract.
The enterprise of the Hawaiian Ma
hogany Lumber Company, which has
established a modern tie mill at Pa
hoa with a capacity of $500 ties daily,
will add greatly to the volume of busl-
ness. With this mill it is expected to
fill the contract the company has with
the Santa Fe railroad for 100000 ohia
railroad ties, and these are all con-
tracted to be hauled to tidewater over
a
Mahogany Lumber Company is seeking
to develop a large amount of koa lum-
Der. for which market is opening in
the United States, and this lumber also
will he hauled over the Hilo railroad.
Stone for Breakwater.
The road, in order to meet the re-
1uirements for hauling the rock needed
for the first section of the HilO break
water, is building two miles of addl-
tional track. Part of this is to con-
meet the line with the quarry in Puma
from which, under the contract with
the United States government, the rock
IS to come, and the remainder is to ex-
END the line of the road to where the
rock is to be delivered for placing in
he breakwater. The road has the con-
,ract for hauling all of this rock,
which. under the present contract, Is.
estimated at 10000 tons.
These new enterprises, in addition to
previous sources of freight tonnage, all
IF which have been growing, though
slowly, with the development of the
country, give a very encouraging out
ook. to its future.
rrba
With the building of the Hilo break
water, resulting, as it necessarily will,
N a greater concentration of the ship
hing of Hawaii products from Hilo, will
make more and more imperative the
eventual extension of the road along
he Hilo and Hamakua coasts. The
abroad now has a mileage of 1925
niles of main and branch track of
tandard gauge, built with 56-pound
ails, and equipped with five locomO-
ives and ~ passenger and freight cars.
Cotton Planting.
Cotton planting, which at various
lines during the past fifty years has
)een much talked of, is now about to
lave a more complete test as a crop
han it has ever had in these Islands.
and researches at the
United States Agricultural Experiment
station have been carried ON to such
IN extent as in its results to offer in
lueements to a number of men in the
stands to undertake its cultivation as
crop. Several hundred acres will be
tainted this year Among others, Gay
Robinson, on the Island of Kauai, |
=.
areas of land near Pearl |
Iarbor are to be planted. The varie |
les to be planted are the Sea Island |
Otton, which, because of its long and |
,inky staple, is especially adapted for |
he manufacture of thread and the |
highest grades of cotton cloth, and a |
-ariety which is grown to some extent |
n Queensland. and has similar quail |
les to those of the Sea Island cotton, |
living it, like the latter, price in !
he world 8 markets almost double that |
f the ordinary staple cotton.
Advantages of Cotton Planting.
Cotton is a crop that is salable with
n four months after it is planted, and |
therefore, does not require the capital |
o undertake its cultivation which |
ONE other crops do which take a year |
nd half to seven or eight years to |
-ield return. 1t is also urged as a |
uitable crop to alternate with cane, |
vhen cane lands begin to show the eff |
eets of unremitting and long continued |
ugar cropping. Besides the crop of |
otton itself, the cotton seed is a source
# at least two by-products of value. |
These are cotton seed oil, which has a |
teady and remunerative price in the |
world 5 markets. and cotton seed meal, |
which is a food of the highest value |
or livestock, and an especially desir- |
bile one here where so large a proper |
ion of the food for livestock has to
,e brought in from elsewhere.
Mating Sedges.
Another industry which is to be
yiven a trial through the research and
Investigations of the Experiment Sta
ion is the growing of sedges for the
manufacture of mating. These sedges
we're introduced here, one variety from
Japan, and another from China. They
viii grow in salt and brackish marshes
where nothing else useful will They
Fan be planted like rice by sticking
growing sedges in the mud, and they