PART 11. 
maize receives and harvest, have over-run the land. Indeed, in some 
cases, it is difficult to decide whether the crop is maize or some new 
type of yellow flowered chicory. The competition for nutrients and 
for water is generally won by the weeds and the crop suffers badly. 
It is this successful competition for water on the part of the weed that 
gives the foundation for the cry of decreasing rainfall; it is not a 
decrease in the rainfall but a decrease in the available rainfall that is 
limiting crop production. Unlike the rain, beyond human control, 
notwithstanding claims to the contrary, the control of the availability 
of the rainfall is largely within the powers of the farmer. The control 
entails rotation of crops, maintenance of soil structure, and clean 
cultivation and tillage at the proper time. 
Single crop farming, unlike planting, does not demand very close 
supervision, and where coffee plantations are measured in tens of 
acres, maize farms are measured in hundreds. These large farms 
unless heavily capitalised and run on factory lines, cannot be kept 
cleanly cultivated and, as long as they are retained, their owners will 
have to be content with a decreasing return due to increasing competi- 
tion for water and nutrients by weeds. 
The decrease in nett return on the larger farms is becoming so 
serious that a plunge into rotational farming, even of the simplest 
type, cannot be undertaken lightly, lest the loss on the area under 
unproductive crops absorb the profits on the rest of the farm. The 
necessary manuring entailed means so heavy an outlay on fertilisers 
that the large owner cannot risk the expenditure; an application of as 
little as 100lbs. per acre of Seychelles guano, the cheapest phosphatic 
manure available in Kenya, involves the man with 1,000 acres under 
maize in an outlay of £300 to £400. Unless he have a large capital, 
so as to stand any losses, it will be impossible for the farmer on a large 
scale to utilise the rainfall, the limiting factor to maize production, 
to its greatest extent. The day of the smaller farm cultivated more 
intensely, probably yielding a greater nett return than the large farm, 
is dawning. Until this condition is attained the necessary freedom 
from weeds will not be secured. 
Much may be done while the present system lasts by cleaning the 
field as soon after harvest as possible instead of waiting till the time 
of ploughing. The burning of the stalks early would destroy a great 
many weeds. An early ploughing to enable the weed seeds to 
germinate readily followed by cultivations to destroy the young weeds 
will rapidly decrease their number. 
At the same time the soil will not be dried out so badly during 
the dry season; there will be a small residum of moisture in the soil 
to be added to the rains. Into the rotation must be introduced crops 
capable of smothering the weeds. The system outlined can only be 
fully applied on a small farm. 
Before any rotational system of farming will be adopted it must 
be shown, by costed demonstrations, that the system will give an 
increased nett revenue over the period of the rotation, and that the 
unproductive leguminous green manure crop only means a temporary 
loss of revenue for that field only. Proof only will cause the farmer 
to depart from his present practices. 
This insistence upon the use of leguminous green manures, when 
the wealth of the indigenous flora in legumes and the time the soil 
has been under cultivation are taken into consideration, may appear 
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