MR STEAD AS A SHEEPBREEDER.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13104, 1 May 1908, Page 7

MR STEAD AS A SHEEPBREEDER.

'From the nature of the large business he carried on as a grain and , seed merchant, tho late Mr Stead was a] r ways in dose touch with agricultuifri ana pastoral matters, and at various: times carried on farming and shoepbjwedin.g on his own account. Ho was afco one of the first membera of the CaTrterbury Agricultural College Board, when the institution was soparated from Canierbuxy College. the fat lamb ind-ustry was in its infancy in Canterbury Mr Stead was orae of tiho earlket in the market each season with lambs raised on his farm, known as "Oorintga," and ho -generally topped the market at Aldington. Hβ wee one of the first to recognise tho value of the Shropshire for crossing purposes for the production, of fat lambs, and on hie taking over, with the lato Hon. J. T. Peacock, Brown's farm at Dromore, he boc&rae the owner oF what was tlie largest flock of purebred Shflopshires in Now ZeaJamd. On c visit being paid there in 1899 it waa ascertained that the flock consisted of 800 breediag e\rce, 350 ewe hoggeto, 100 ram hoggets, '90 wethor hog,Reta, and severed stud rams. The flock had been started about ten years previously',, same of the first ew«s being obtained from Mr T. E. Upton, Sherwood, Ashbnrton, ■while rams wer© afterwards purchased, from the late Mr J. Grigg, Longboach, and Messrs Rowley and Hamilton, Inycaxairgill. Two rams were afterwairdk imported from. Mr J. Beach's flocfc, "The Baltone," Wolverhanrptan, Staffordshire. When Mr Stead was ob Homo in 1897 he visited the Royal Sliow at Manchester and. bought two ram lambs from the late Mr PhnJo I*. Milk, of Ruddington Haill, NotHioeham. These two rame were subsequently named Gold Medallist and. Conqueror, after two of Mt SteadPa, welt-known racehorses of the day, and they have played an important part in improving the Shropshire flocks of the pn>vinoe. Brown's Farm was afterwords sold to a syndScate and_ eubdgvidod, oirad tho flock was daspersed, among those Who made purchases beimg / Mr J. W. Rogers, who lrad> been Mr Stead's manager on im© farm. Mr Stead aftce- ,- ■waaxfe purchased MacdonaH Downs nm.near Waikare, from Mr Tht». York, and then he took an intoa«et in the production of halfbred wooj. After a few years he sold the run to Mr G. L. Rntherford, aod , bought part of tho Kereru estate, Hawker's Bay, where his eldest son, Mr W. G. Stead, now resides.