Only first teaching and then practice will enable either European or Native to plant well. This is how it should be done.
Take the seedling in the left hand, holding it by the stem just above the collar; then take the very end of the tap-root between the second and third fingers of the right hand, and thus put it down into the hole (you thus insure the tap-root being straight). Now judge exactly the height of the collar that it be as directed. Rest the left arm then on the ground to keep the plant steady, release the tap-root, and fill up the hole about one-third, pressing the soil lightly. The plant will then be fixed, and you can employ both hands to fill up the remainder, and keep the rootlets in a lateral position. Press the soil lightly as you do so, and when all is filled up press it down a little harder round the stem of the plant.
All the transplanting should be finished as early in the rains as possible. A seedling, planted in the first fifteen days of June, is worth two planted in July, and after the latter month it is generally a case of seedlings and labour lost.
Days with heavy rain are not good to plant in. Those with showers or light drizzling rain are best. When there is very heavy rain the soil “cakes” much. Fine days, if the ground is wet, and if more rain may soon be looked for, are good, better though if cloudy than sunny.
Where much planting has to be done, of necessity planting must be carried on daily, for, as observed, it _must_ all be finished by end of July at latest.
In case of a sunny break in the weather, stop planting after the second day, for early rain to young transplants is a necessity.
In making a garden too much care cannot be given to the way seedlings are placed in their homes.
Just before sending the third edition to press, I saw in the _Indian Tea Gazette_ some details of “new transplanting and transporting tools,” patented by Mr. Jeben. I hope these will prove a success, for such are much wanted, and if they will do all it is said they can do, a great boon will have been conferred by Mr. Jeben on the Tea industry.
Mr. J. W. Mountjoy, of Pandawbrang, Arracan, writes as follows regarding these tools:--
“The Transplanter has, in working, proved to be a complete success. Almost all the remaining seedlings have been transplanted by the aid of your instrument, without the slightest injury to their roots or check to their growth. The fact is, the young plants do not know that they have been transplanted, and now that sunshine has succeeded the late very heavy rains, new and vigorous growth is ‘bursting out’ from all the seedlings that were transplanted by means of your Transplanter. No manager of a Tea or Coffee plantation, who had once seen this instrument at work, would ever again be likely to recur to transplanting by hand, and not a single seedling should die when removed from the nursery and carried to its place of ultimate growth by means of your Transplanter. Your transplanting apparatus is better than baskets, and has moreover the great recommendation of being very economical. Your Transplanter will, with moderate care, last for many years, and combines thorough economy with thorough efficiency.”