THE DROUGHT SPECTRE.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 23, 28 January 1928, Page 14

THE DROUGHT SPECTRE.

A LAND MAN'S PROBLEM.

WHAT TO SOW FOR WINTER

Professional gardeners are declaring this an extraordinary spell of dryness. Cultivation, usually sufficient to ward off wilting, has this season proved woefully inadequate, and even trees in places are dying. Yet technically this is no drought. According to weather science, drought is three months' total absence of rain, and the occasional fewspecks of rain, linnoticeable by thirsty plants and tired water carriers, have robbed us of the rare honour of experiencing a real honest-to-goodness drought. Dry Welis and Watercourses. In suburban and rural parts wells and creeks are dry for the first time in decades, and cowherds are twice daily being driven to strange wateringplaces. Sometimes these are on the property of an obliging neighbour. At others the relief has to be sought at a roadside bridge, where a bucket on the end of a rope hauls up water to pour into a drinking tub. Buyers of farms are making unwonted investigations into the water supply of the properties offered them, and sellers, quite sure of the wet propensities of their holdings in an ordinary summer, are finding difficulty in carrying cohviction to land seekers. The market value of shares in well-boring and concrete tank companies ought to be soaring, and dam-building information is a topic to which many farmers will listen just now. Beyond it all, the feed In the pastures that the fires do not consume is thin and languishing, and in some cases dead. The gospel of lucerne-sowing—that famous drought-defier — is met with the impossibility of ploughing brick-hard paddocks. Many fodder crops, green and thrifty through it all, are not making much bulk, and there comes more suggestive every day the prospect of an early sudden winter. The winter outlook is a real spectre, though somewhat distant. Good adequate soaking rain in January and February could cover the warm landscape with a wealth of precious forage, produced with phoenix-like speed; but if the rain is niggardly the stock will consume all the growth as fast as it increases and start a winter of starvation. Store cattle are a poor investment just now The milk flow is but a trickle. And the hard soil makes fodder cropping—-what is every wise farmer's lesource a tough propositon. < Some Fodders to Sow Now. The best fodder seed to sow in these warm conditions is Japanese millet combined with peas and perhaps "hardv grfeen turnips—the turnip seed to be sown thickly to produce leafage This will bring relief in March, if i uck favours. For later cutting—resistant to frost and enduring all through the winter—February sowings of Algerian oats, with Scotch tares and perhaps "hardy green" turnips, arc recommended. From half an acre to one acre per cow is a good proportion, in -view of the seriousness of the outlook. On more sandy land fit for winter stocking a great area of turnips can be put in cheaply and quickly—yellow-fleshed Aberdeens for preference. Milk taint is not a factor where winter maintenance is the vital need. But heavy turnip feeding necessitates dry roughage like hay or old grass.

Bran is scarce already and hay should ,be a saleable commodity at a high price all through the coming winter. All this emphasises the wisdom of fodder sowing without delay. Speed i 3 important.

Lucerne-sowing should be undertaken till early March —at least a-quarter acre per cow. This will give abundant hay next season.

Topdreas Early and Everywhere,

And in every case topdressing is imperative to force the autumn pasturage. The minimum outlay should be fi per acre (2cwt supcrhphospliate to force the clovcr and -Jcwt sulphate of amiuonia to force the grasses). This should be applied during February in still weather to begin its effect early ami catch all the rains. Many farmers waste their topdressing by being too late. Grass will grow four times as fast in warm February and March as it will in cold, sodden June.