reliable kind, 196 000 hectares (484 300 acres) are unirrigated but produce meagre crops of cereals or are planted to a small extent with vines or olives, and 100 000 hectares (247 000 acres) are altogether uncultivated. The production is uncertain, and in periods of drought the population must either emigrate or starve. The value of the ground in this area may be stated as follows: Even when the cost of the undertaking is deducted, a profit of over 500 pes. per ha. (£6 3s per acre) is obtained; further it is estimated that the annual gross returns will increase from 69 to 349 pes. per hectare (178 to £4 12s per acre). The annual rainfall varies from 8 to 20 inches, but as it is regular and evenly distributed an allowance. of 8 in. of irrigation water would be sufficient to secure the cereal crops. A description is given of a very successful piece of reclamation carried out on a small scale by a landlord in the zone of the Aragon-Catalogna Canal. The water has been brought 5 1⁄2 miles from the main canal, and, in order to provide the necessary labour for the scheme, a small farm colony or model village has been established. The landlord bears all the expense of settling in the tenant or colonist, and of stocking the holding, and receives in return one half of the yields of corn and forage at harvest. The colonists, in addition to cultivating their holdings, undertake to reclaim a certain additional amount of fresh land every year. The contracts are entered into for six years, but any time previous to their expiration the tenant may pay back the expenses incurred on his behalf, and in that case a fresh arrangement is made, by which the tenant retains four-fifths instead of one half of his harvests. Though the system has only been working for three years, already half the loans have been repaid. With regard to method of cropping, as well as in all other questions of farm management, the landlord reserves the right of imposing his rules on the tenant. The reclamation of land is encouraged by paying a fair price (40 s per acre) for all work done by the tenant over and above his contract and, further, the landlord himself reclaims 18 to 20 hect. (44 to 49 acres) every year. In this way 200 hect. (494 acres) of barren land have been brought under cultivation at a cost varying from £5 8s, per acre where the landlord himself bears the cost of the labour, to £ 4 per acre where the colonists supply the lab our; profitable employment has been provided for several families, numbering in all 24 individuals; and the success of the experiment has induced other landlords to initiate similar systems on their estates, so that as the possible irrigation zone of the canal is 100 000 hect. (247 000 acres) it seems safe to predict that the population of the district will shortly increase to five times its present numbers and will more than justify the expenses incurred by the Government in the construction of the canal. 648 The Experimental Drainage Field at Josephsdorf, Germany. KRÜGER, E. in Mitteilungen des Kaiser Wilhelm Instituts für Landwirtschaft, Vol. V, Part 3, pp. 173-185. Berlin, February 1913. As is well-known, the beneficial effect of drainage is not only due to the removal of the superfluous water, but also to the subsequent aeration of the soil. Mierau in 1890, followed first by Klinkert, and recently by Friedersdorff, Holdefleiss and Heinze, showed the importance of studying aeration on experimental fields; but unfortunately no observations have been made on the effect of such aeration. Other points in draining which are of no less consequence are the depth and distance apart of the drains. It is surprising that the exact solution of a question of such great economic importance has been so long deferred. Kopecky was the first to show that the distance between the drains must be determined as a function of the mechanical composition of the soil and of the amount of water to be removed. He advocated therefore the mechanical analysis of the soil as a basis of drainage operations; his suggestion as followed and further developed by Fauser and Canz. Recently Breitenbach has tried to deduce from the hygroscopicity of the soil the right distances at which to place the drains (1). Since the introduction of drainage the question of the most suitable depth for drains in heavy clays has been the sub,ect of the keenest discussion. There is no doubt that the solution of all these questions is of paramourt practical importance. The Minister of Agriculture for Prussia, being convinced of this fact, transmitted, in 1908, Mierau's proposition to the Section of Agricultural Improvements, and entrusted the latter with the task of laying out an experimental field for the purpose of solving all these problems. After a prolonged search, a field suitable for the purpose was found at Josephsdorf in the district of Culm, which its owner, Hr. Plehr, consented to lend for a period of 10 years. According to the project, the following points are to be studied: (r) See No. 1271. B. Sept. 1912. (Ed.). 1) Drainage with drains situated at different distances apart: 52, 40 and 26 ft. 2) Drainage at different depths: 5 ft., 4 ft. and 3 ft. 3) Drainage with and without aeration. There are thus 18 variants. The aim of the drainage experiments is the solution of the following questions: the influence of the variants on a) the production; b) the properties of the air circulating in the soil; c) the amount of water removed; d) the rapidity with which the rain water reaches the drains; e) the development of plant roots; f) the mechanical modifications of the structure of the soil. These are the bases on which the project was elaborated, and the work was begun in March 1911. The field has an area of 8 3/4 acres ; the cost of preparation amounted to £ 97. As the drainage works have only been one year in operation, it is necessarily impossible as yet to give any experimental results. - SCHÖNFELDT, A. 649 - The Best Cross-Section for Ditches in Drainage Operations. Thus in the choice of section it is necessary, apart from theoretical considerations, to have some idea of the relation between the cost and the section, and to choose the smallest form of section which (with the existing fall) will ensure the amount of water required. The formulae of Ganguillet and Kutter are generally employed in making these calculations. From the examples mentioned by the writer it appears that the semicircle where the surface of the water flows through the centre of the circle presents the smallest section. Unfortunately this form of section cannot be used and it is necessary to change the semicircle into a trapezoid in order to reconcile theory and practice. 650 - The Effect of Loosening the Subsoil on Yield. AUGSTIN in Illustrierte Landwirtschaftliche Zeitung, Year 33, No. 32, pp. 303-304. Berlin, April 19, 1913. In loosening the subsoil, as well as in the construction of subsoiling implements, two tendencies have to be sharply distinguished: one strives to loosen as much as possible of the subsoil to the same depth by means of the broadest possible implement, and without mixing the loosened subsoil with the upper layer; the other endeavours to cut by means of a spring chisel-shaped subsoiler the deepest possible groove about 14 inch wide in the bottom of the furrow, with the result that a part of the loosened subsoil falls again into the groove, while the greater part in a state of fine division gets mixed with the upper layer. In order to investigate the relative ad TILLAGE AND vantages of the two systems and to compare the effects of deep and shallow ploughing, the writer conducted some cultivation experiments at Friedeberg and at Zieckau in the autumn of 1911, on two fields each 1 hectare (2.47 acres) in extent. At Friedeberg the soil of the experiment field is a sandy loam with similar subsoil; at Zieckau, it is a slightly humous and loamy sand with compact loamy sand as subsoil. At Zieckau only oats were grown; at Friedeberg half of the area bore oats and the other half barley. The various plots, save for the ploughing, were all of them treated in exactly the same way. The results are shown in Tables A and B. From these experiments it appears that under some circumstances shallow tillage is more profitable than the more extensive loosening of the subsoil. The richer the upper layer, and the better, more compact and richer the subsoil, the greater success will attend the loosening of the subsoil. Making a groove in the bottom of the furrow requires much less expenditure of power than loosening the subsoil ower the whole width of the furrow with a broad subsoiler, so that even with an equal yield the first method would be preferable; but the experiments show that in two cases out of three the plots with the grooves cut in the bottom of the furrow yielded more than the plots in which the whole of the subsoil had been loosened. It is probable also that the effects of the first method last longer on account of the solid balks of earth which remain and support the upper layer and prevent the loosened subsoil being compressed again too soon. The writer, wishing to investigate the question thoroughly, will repeat these experiments for several years and will include in them experiments on the moisture and bacterial content of the soil. 651 - The Possibilities of Profitable Cultivation in the Dry Districts of Ceylon. FERNANDO, H. M. (A paper read at the meeting of the Ceylon Board of Agriculture). - The Tropical Agriculturist, Vol. XL, No. 2, pp. 100-102. Colombo, February 1913. Ceylon may be divided into three zones: the moist and dry low country areas, and the hill country. Leaving the hill country aside, the moist low country area which is situated in the south-west of the island is where the perennal crops (coconut, tea, rubber, etc.) are cultivated; the dry low |