JOBS FOR INVENTORS

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 1, Issue 16, 26 May 1939, Page 2

JOBS FOR INVENTORS

DISPLACING COWS AND BEES Organised inventors, assembled i; Chicago on an April afternoon, won oer ng what to devise next. gaze< avidly at the humble honey bee, in (lustrious and able. ' He's got something we ain't got ' they agreed. The cow, too, the national Invent or s Congress put on its list of own ers of territory the geniuses migh try muscling into. The Congress, preparing for its an nual Chicago Exposition, June 6 to S included among things the wori< yearns for the following: An apparatus or process to extrac honey and sugar from blossoms am instead of relying on bees. A process to extract milk and but terfat from such feeds as are givei cows. An amphibian automobile, and 011 tli tit will skim over the top of snow drifts. A method tc- collect and store elec tricity from lightning. A power axe for chopping dowi trees - Fabricated seats for farm machine to replace metal ones, which ar doubly uncomfortable on cold an wet days. CULLING "ROBBER" COWS A total of 450 head of dairy stoc was collected in the cull drive cai ried out by the Southern Hawke 5 Bay Herd Testing Association las week. These are now being drive on to the Waingawa works at Ma? terton, with the exception of 24 hea sent by rail. Thi s brings the tot;i collected for this year ending Ma 31 to 1200. compared with 800 la* year. There is to be at least on more drive this month. The cow Put in the drive are animals whic herd testing has shown to be ur economic, not necessarily diseased ar inals. This method of dealing wit Ihe m ensures their removal from th dairy industry.

general notes FARMERS' UNION MEMBERSHIP Though there are 00,000 farmers in New Zealand eligible for member, ship of the Farmers' Union, only about 20,000 have joined that body. )f SHORTHORN CARCAS CHAMPION > r A Shorthorn steer won the supreme 0 championship for carcases at the n National Western Live Stock Show y at Denver, Colorado, U.S.A. in com e petition with the Hereford and the n Aberdeen-Angus. This steer which n weighed 976 1 las. on hoof, was shown by the Colorado State College. The reserve champion carcase was a Heree ford heifer shown by the University j of Nebraska. A NEW SCARECROW An explosive scarecrow has been r tested by a Continental inventor; it L consists of an acetylene generator with explosion chamber attached. £ When concentration of acetylene is sufficient, gas mixture is exploded by a naked flame, kept burning permanently. Apparatuses hung on trees in cherry forests. Explos. ions once every 15 to 20 minutes are sufficient for forests; every 3 to 5 min 1 utes for orchards. Over 3 acres of cherry orchard are destitute of birds after one explosion. s FRUIT GROWING IN CANADA The so.called treeless prairies of 1 -which "were once only con- - sidered suitable for growing Avheat . and other cereals, will one day be_ s come an important factor in the . fruit-growing industry of Canada. I While fruit tree growing is still in, a i more o r less experimental stage or ) hobby among a few farmers, already - lfi.iO fruit trees have been planted : since 1927 ( of which 1400' have sur-. . vived. and many of them are now , bearing, having produced 6600 pounds of fruit in 1938. WAGES IN ITALY The Central Corporative Committee met at the Palazzo Venezia recently under Signor Mussolini's chair manship t to work out details of the increase of 6 to 10 per cent in wages to meet the higher cost of living, of the 7,000,000 workers affected 3,000, 000 are operatives and artisans, 2,000, 000 farm* labourers, and 2,000,000 clerks. It will cost employers about £11,000,000 to effect the inciease. The Government will take measures to keep food prices at their present level. HEALTH ASPECTS OF MILK In a, paper on "Health Aspect s of th e Milk Supply," Professor J. C. Drnmmond Professor of Biochemistry, London University, said that research had proved to be falacious the statement that vitamins in food were destroyed by heating and by cooking. Notwithstanding this, the statement remained the main argument —sometimes by reason of ignorance, more often because of prejudice and feai —of those who opposed proposals to make general and pasteurising of milk intended for human consumption. The meeting in Reading (England) of the Division for the Social and International Relations of Science, before which the paper was read. t passed a resolution recommend, ing compulsory pasteurisation in all areas of 20,000 population or more.