The Rice belt journal. (Welsh, Calcasieu Parish, La.) 1900-19??, 1914-07-24

bnrnan habitations and people as well, but the
character Of the crops under cultivation makes
IL necessary that the peasants should be housed
in settlements or villages away from the large
wet areas given up to the growing OF rice and
other crops.
These rice areas are divided up into fields or
plots of all shapes and sizes by small grass-grown
ridges a few inches in height and averaging
about foot in BREADTH thus enclosing the soft
mud in which the rice is planted Phe prepare
ton Of these fields is extremely arduous work,
Involving much hoeing and careful construction
OF these mud dams, and it includes whole sys-
tenn of terFacing whereby the water necessary
for irrigation Is led gradually down from field to
field for all Mgh.cIass rice requires flooding The
little streams and riyulets which provide the
water for these terraced hills and wide valleys
are very often shaded by bamboo plants, and
these streams feed the bitches cut for water
channels; narrow tracks or footpaths are also
made through the rice fields But IL these fields
look desolate at springtime there is no lack OF
life in them when, the planting season begins In
June for then they are filled with men and
women busily engaged in transplanting the young
rice plants; and, fortunately for this industry,
Japan possesses aslarge supply Of cheap labor.
Fhe seeds OF the rice are first thickly sown In the
small wet fields, or nursery beds IN the early
spring tApril), and when the young plants have
attained the height of four inches or thereabouts,
they are very carefully transplaned to the larger
fields at wider interYalss1ip rows. and, as may be
imagined this Is an exceedingly aborious kind
3 Of work, When one looks at the innumerable lit
tie plants In the nurseries with their vivid green
sAoets and misunderstanding roots. the removing
of them by hand tothe larger fields and planting
siugly seems an almost impossible task and with
hoe tohf No h,,kf ho ca7krt
OF Japan have been accustomed to this tedious
method Of agriculture through many centuries
aud, from habit, it Is taken as matter of course,
and the men and women standing kneedeep in
the mud and water and STOPPING over their toll
some work, spare no pains in the planting out of
the young rice in the soft mud The value Of the
harvest Is probably in their minds as the reward
for all this labor.
The eastern agricultural aboFer must be seen
TO be fuzzy realized, Japanese backs are supple
hut the sight of so much STOPPING and bending
IS enough to make European feel the pains OF
lumbago In his back from the mere contempla-
ton OF It.
When the rice Is growing up then the fields
show very brilliant green, and they are kept
under a few inches of water all the time the
young crops are growing, which is only drained
away just before the harvesting OF the rice. The
rice plant blooms early in September, and the
crops are reaped in October and hung up to dry
on short poles. The threshing is done with fails
or heokles, a kind of comb. Various methods Of
fertilization are used by the Japanese farmer
some OF them most unsaYory to the European
nose; in fact, the smells" that emanate from the
ground in the agricultural districts in japan often
destroy ones sense Of appreciation OF their int
cultivation when inspecting it closely, and the
Japanese people must either have less keen nose:
than ours or else do not mind the odors. for they
appear in nosway to affect them as they do our
selves If European takes walk In the rict
fields. or paddy fields, as he calls them, durinl
the hot months he is sure to get severely bitten
by mosquitoes and for Europeans living near the
rice areas these pests are great trial during
the summer
Some Europeans have stated that Japan pro