NOTES BY THE WAY

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22141, 10 July 1937, Page 9

NOTES BY THE WAY

RUGGING OF SHEEP

There has been a fair amount of experimenting to ascertain the value of the practice of rugging sheep. Mr R. C. Tcdhunter. of Blackford Station, Mount Hutt, immediately after shearing them last October, rugged tour two-shear merino wethers and left tour unruled, the sheep being; divided as evenly as possible trcm the viewpoints cf frame, weight, and wool. He turned

i them out together with 3;.0 ram ho _;- sets. After bang on pasture th-2 mob Was put on turnip-- in the middle of May. There was nothing elaborate .11 the way of covers which ccnJstea only of" sack matenr.L There is now a striking in trn "ro"-th <~' the wool and its brigntness in favour of the rugged ih.- tn.o.*. is that the rain is prevented by tae rugging frcm penetrating down to the skin and chilling it, thereby -ffectin., wool growth. At all events, the greater weight of the fleece is cbv.ous, and Mr Totihunter propo:es, if he can I make arrangements, to have the eight I Lhecp at the National stock market at ' Addington next month to show farrn- ! ers the progress result. In a com- - munication with a leading Sydney j stock firm he was informed that the ! difference in the value of the wool of ia rugged sheen cv-r that of unruled ; has been shown by practice at 6s a i head. . . The effect of rain on the weigh*, me I sheep has to carry about was: demonI Crated some ye«-rs ago by Mr lodI hunter and a neighbour. They both 'had about 40 sheep with double I fleeces in their muster. The neighbour decided not to shear his so late in j the s ason on amount of th ■ rs' o less However, the sheep did not surv ve the winUr.and the conclusion was that the greatly increased weight imparted to the double fleece as th. cause. In the other case the sheep were shorn with something more than the usual amount of the staple let, and the losses were nil.

LANDS FOR SETTLEMENT One phase of Government activities which has almost completely disappeared this last five or six years is the opening cf Crown lands for m-nt. The Lands Department has jus. ssued a list of sections now available. There is only one rural section in th South Island—in Southland, comprising 128 acres. There is one- building allotment in Canterbury—at Rakaaand four suburban allotirrnts n Southland. There are 13 rural holdings in North Auckland, ranging from &J to 223 acres, one in Auckland, and two in Taranaki. The whole area mvo vee. is only 3204 acres. In the condition' prevailing there seems little prospect of this greatest of all Government, activities of 30 years ago being revived to any appreciable extent.

GESTATION PERIODS A breeder of wide experience questioned to the writer on Wednesday the soundness of the deduction made in England that Rcmney ewes crossed with Southdown rams failed to ccme to their milk properly at lambing, orin other words, the lambs were short carried. The sire of the lamb should make no difference to the milk developing capacity of the ewe, or the carrying period, he raid. The period of gestation of the two breeds is suggested by the Home observers as a possible cause of the Romney s milk delay. In the Canterbury mans experience the most potent cause of a va-iation in the carrying of the lamb is the weather. As farmer? well know, lambs as a rule come regularly within a few days of the proper time, but it only requires a burst of rough weather to exnedite the lambmg. and it the following day should be fine the normal rate of lambing is promptly, resumed. His experience over many years has been similar to that at Lincoln College and elsewhere—i.e., that the crossing makes no difference to the time the lambs are crrried. This breeder reminded the witer of an old saving—"'a mare and a hare go 12 months." This does not mean that thev each go the n months, but the mare takes 11 months and the hare one. which may surprise many people. It is interesting to note that in a record comoiled in England some years ago from many thousands of ca-es there was a case of a mare going 419 davs. and on the other trmH f he sho-t----est period recorded was 322 days. The average was 347 days. Cows varied f-om 321 davs down to 240, the average bein" 283. and ewes from 161 dwn t> 150. the average being 154 days. This experience show a few mo~e days in the case of than is the exi5 or i"nc> in New Zea'and. as shown hv Mr Sidey in *f and Lincoln College experiments.

While on the subject, it may be of inte-est to note that a rra r e will take r ervic«? in from seven to 10 r>ays a f ter the bMh of the foal, and if unsuccns<=fu'. ji thrp° weeks th° c l "' from 21 to 28 days, the ew about 150 days, and th° af'er about five weeks, but usually five to seven days after weaning.

CHOU MOELLIER The illustration on the farm page to-day is of a crop that is app r a : sed fa«- too lightly in CanlerbuT—<"hnu Besides the tremendous weight o"f feed an acre which it produces it has a defln'te value in oreirrving stock One grower, hq« a smal' patch year, told f"llv r.b«<-vrd the h<=f>l+h of hi<s y-'lig after bciri<* fed ohnu moell'er. and thev rt Tj'a"lv of the ncnil trniiMos The was a dea T"'irh tis"f'"l a vph' c fjr > to a In* o e Ori° i"V,-tv, »-'-,„t' v r>,i,~w flr.cVrmrr|or v»t on 50 hie: fl<-ir»l' O* 1 "00 fnd Ca^O to th« in the best of health an** corHit'on. T pet h'"h and there is p general imthat ohiu mo°l'ier renuirnn T opli v stronf?. heavy land to achieve results. Such i* not "eces c arilv the case. In the ewe ca-rying expedience auoteH the lpnd was of very medium ou.-l'ty. Th" crOD in this case was not more than two feet hi"h. The finer of the sho'-tT growth artuallv added to Us feed ; n<? va'ue and it >ex>t on growing a'ter being grazed. The croo that freque"tlv gows on st'ona an objection through the coarseness of stalk. A heavier sowing is one way of avoiding coarse stalks, and 31b of seed to the acre instead of 21b is not now an unusual practice. The general impression has been that chou moellier is almost solely a feed for dairy cows. Experience shows that this is far from beij>g the case.