Farmers of forty centuries; or, Permanent agriculture in China, Korea and Japan . )lace inthe row. There was no packing of earth abcnit the roots, each hillbeing set with a single motion, which followed one another in 256 RICE CULTURE IN THE ORIENT quick succession, completing one cross row of six hills afteranother. The men move backward across the field, completing oneentire section, tossing the unused plants into the unset field; thenreset the lines to cover another section. We were told that theusual days work of transplanting, for a man under these con-ditions, after the field is fitted a


Farmers of forty centuries; or, Permanent agriculture in China, Korea and Japan . )lace inthe row. There was no packing of earth abcnit the roots, each hillbeing set with a single motion, which followed one another in 256 RICE CULTURE IN THE ORIENT quick succession, completing one cross row of six hills afteranother. The men move backward across the field, completing oneentire section, tossing the unused plants into the unset field; thenreset the lines to cover another section. We were told that theusual days work of transplanting, for a man under these con-ditions, after the field is fitted and the plants are brought to him,is two mow or one-third of an acre. The seven men in this groupwould thus set 2| acres per day and, at the wage Mrs. Wu waspaying, the cash outlay, if the help was hired, would be nearly21 cents per acre. This is at a lower rate than we arc able to set. Fra. 145. - Group of Chinese women pulling rico in a nursery bed, tying the plantsin bundles preparatory to transplanting. cabbage and tobacco plraits with our best macliine methods. InJapan, as seen in Figs. 147 and 148, the women participate in thework of setting the plants more than in China. After the rice has been transplanted its care, unlike that of ourwheat crop, does not cease. It must be hoed, fertilized andwatered. To facilitate the watering all fiekls have been levelled,canals, ditches and drains provided, and, to aid in fertilizing andhoeing, the setting has been in rows and in hills in the row. The first working of the rice fields after the transplantipg, aswe saw it in Japan, consisted in spading beiween the hills witha four-tined hoe, apparently more for loosening the soil and aera-tion than for killing weeds. After this treatment the field was gone TRANSPLANTING RICE 257


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