The Farmers Column

Bruce Herald, Volume IX, Issue 805, 23 May 1876, Page 7

The Farmers Column

TIIE DIFFERENCE IN FEEDING HORSES

M. Adenot, according to the " "French Circular Letter ' experimented with feeds of equal rations of nine pounds each of maize and oats, on forty- eight of his waggon horses, extending over a period of tea months. The animals lost one-fifth of their draught power, which they recovered, however, when their full oat ration was restored ; the economy in the way of oats disappeared by loss of strength. One-eighth of maize with oats turned out well, but then the maize must be American, not French. How nearly soever related maize and oats may be chemically, in physiological effects they are widely different. Thaer and Dombasle recommend buckwheat for farm horses as being capable of replacing in part oate. Their opinion is questioned ; but buckwheat differs in richness according as it may have been when matured or otherwise. M. Adenot has found a mixture of 13 pounds of oats with six pounds of rye very successful. His experience extended over 15 years, the stable containing not less than 350 draught horsea ; the mixture was not equal in producing vigor to oats alone, but was not the less a capital feed when grain was scarce. In former times wheat was given to stallions during the season of serving, and to mares when suckling ; but wheat fattened rather than imparted strength or produced muscle. In the production and reparation of muscular force, beans rank with oatp, exciting the appetite, aDd excellent for horses that digest badly their full feed of grain. Field peas are favored by some for fast horses ; improving their wind. BLOOD AS MAN U UK. We learn from the ' Sydney Mail ' that extensive experiments are being carried on with a view of utilising the blood from the public abattoirs. The blood, of which from four to five tons are daily taken from the slaughterhouses, ia conveyed in covered carts to the Botanic Gardens, where it is deodorised by means of earth. The mixture of soil does not materially affect its fertilising properties, and the perfectly inodorous compound is now being largely sold for manure. ULEACUED WHEAT. The following article, from the 'Adelaide Observer,' contains much that is instructive to the Now Zealand farmer : — Now that the painful fact has forced itself upon us that a large quantity of the wheat in the Colony has been more or less damaged by the heavy rains that fell about Christinas, and that a considerable proportion of the grain that is finding its way to market is being rejected as unfit for shipment, it becomes a serious question as to how the relative values of good and bad samples are to be adjusted, so that a fair and equitable standard may be fixed to which both buyer and seller may appeal for the settlements of disputes that must inevitably arise between them. In the first place, what real harm has been done ? Is the injury one of fancy or of fact ? Is bleached wheat really as good as unbleached ? Millers who have tried it say so; that the flour is weaker and will not make anything like so many loaves to the sack as if it were made out of good wheat. And this is after all the crucial teat. They claim a rebate of 3d to 5d a bushel on the bleached samples in consequence. But are the millers prepared to take a lower price for their flour? If one-half if it is made from inferior wheat, then ifc follows as a natural sequence that tlie article they produce is not as good as usual ; and, as the raw material cos.ts them less, surely ( the manufactured product should be sold at a comparative reduction. Ifc will probably be argued that a bushel of good wheat weighs on an average say Gllbs. whereas a bushel of bleached wheat only weighs about GOlbs ; but wheat is not cold by measure. A3 regards those who buy for shipment, their case is very different to the millers'. They have orders say for cargoes of South Australian wheat, and their customers expect; to get wheat of a good sound quality. It would never do for them to ship grain bleached and otherwise damaged by the weather. Those who had given them the order would probably throw the cargo on their hands upon arrival at its destination, and decline to trade with the shippers in future. It is self-evident that English orders cannot be executed with bleached wheat. The only chance to get rid of it is to ship ifc on consignment; and will prudent people do this ? Our damaged wheat has lost the speciality for which South Australian wheat has hitherto been so justly celebrated. It has not that peculiar strength and dryness which rendered it so Buitable for mixing purposes, and will now hare tp corxipptp ivfc hpfpe wjth Npw Zealand and Tasmanian sorts, and in fact ' be classed with medium qualities iustead of first-rate ones. And this ia all the more unfortunate from the fact that the English wheats this year are very soft and damp, and selling at a low price.

;We"are assured by competent authorities recently arrived from Home, that our bleached wheats will be very difficult of sale in Mark Lane at even a reduction of 6d a bushel as compared with the unbleached. We learn that hundreds of bags are being daily rejected at Port Adelaide, shippers positively refusing to receive it, and that considerable trouble and annoyance eneue to both shippers and agents. We. hope, for the sake of the good name of South Australia as the best wheat-growing country in the world, that none of the damaged samples will be attempted to be palmed off on English account. It is very easy to destroy a reputation even as good as ours, and once confidence ie lost, the difficulties of regaining it are neither few nor small. England is the market to which we shall have to look for many years to come as the outlet for the increasing surplus of grain which we hope to produce, and we say unhesitatingly that ifc would in the long run pay the South Australian farmers better to destroy every bushel of damaged grain they hold than injure their reputation in the best and largest market in the world, by allowing inferior wheat to be sent forward as though it were good. It is of no use shirking the matter any longer. Material damage has been done, to our wheat crop, and much of it is considerably depreciated in value. The question is how to appraise that depreciation, so as to be fair between buyer and seller, farmer and dealer. A suggestion has been made which appears feasible, and it is that the standard weight of good wheat being fixed at say Q4< lbs a buahel, so that the deduction to be made would be 4d a bushel from the current price of good sound wheat. A market for ifc would doubtless be found in England or elsewhere ; but let it be shipped for what ifc really is — grain slightly damaged with the rain — and not foisted off as a fair sample of South Australian produce. We hope that the farmers and those who deal in grain will be able to arrive at some amicable and satisfactory arrangements, for as ifc is, business is exceedingly slack, and that, too, at a season of the year when it should be at its height.