TOPICS OF THE DAY

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27796, 22 October 1955, Page 7

TOPICS OF THE DAY

SUNNY NAPIER!

Napier let its champions down badly during the recent Grassland Conference. Mr R. H. Scott of the Department of Agriculture prefaced bta paper on “Farming in Hawkes Bay” with the words, “You are in sunny Hawke’s Bay. ... This city of Napier enjoys an average of 2420 hours ot sunshine per annum which, if you look at it on a daily basis, is equivalent to just over 6J.hours of sunshine a day for every day of the year. But throughout the week of the conference Napier provided dismal, rainy weather with an entire . absence of sunshine. Indeed, even as Mr Scott was reading his sunshine statistics the rain petted down. Hawke’s Bay .has experienced an unusually wet spring and, pcrnwiß of this a week, ago most tanners were well behind with their shearing and land cultivation. In consequence nogget wool at least is bound to open up poorly.

GORSE PLANTS WERE BIG BUSINESS

Several legends exist as to how gorse and various other noxious weeds and pests came to be established in New Zealand. There are all sorts ot fanciful tales about how this early settler or that in a burst Of sentiment

pocketed a few gone, sweetbriar or broom seeds before embarking fiar the promised land so as to pro. vide his new home overseas with a certain amount of old world flavour. It would seem, however, that soma at least of today’s pests were imported and propagated in cold blood and dn a commercial scale. Thus 94 yean ago in the advertising columns ot “The Press” one may read an advertisement for the sale or 100,000 gorse plants, as well as sweetbriar, English and Cape broom plants and 50,000 “thorn quicks.” The advertiser was one W. (“Cabage”) Wilson of Christchurch." In the' same issue William Hislop, Woodburn Nursery, Christchurch, advertised upwards of 1,000,000 hedge plants including gorse, broom and ‘ r quicks.” REVOLUTION IN WOOL SCOURING

A new “spirit method” of scouring wool was demonstrated to delegates to the International Wool Textile Research conference in Melbourne at the beginning of this month. The new method of de-greasing wool by dry cleaning with white spirit instead of scouring with soap solutions was ex?lained at the Geelong research aboratories of the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. Mr J. F. Sinclair, the inventor, pointed out that the process was quicker, more efficient and more effective than normal scouring methods. The main advantage ot the new process was that the wool fibres were not entangled to anything like the same degree as with normal scouring. This fibre entanglement, which worsted manufacturers describe as a bugbear, makes wool sorting and reclassing difficult and costly. The new process also gave a higher proportion of tops, and the yarn was of better colour. Other advantages were the smallness of the plant and elimination of the effluent problem. Valuable fleece byproducts could also be easily recovered. “The cost of a complete plant,” said Mr Sinclair, “is about the same as the usual scouring set. The cost of degreasing favourably with soap and soda scouring.”

MATTER FOR CONCERN In his monthly survey of farming conditions, the acting fields superintendent of the Department of Agriculture, Christchurch, notes: “Reports from Mid-Canterbury and North Canterbury of heavy mortality of bees in commercial apiaries are attributed to aerial treatment of in-flower chou moellier crops for aphis control.” Apart from the loss to apiarists, this reduction in our bee peculation is possibly fraught with serious conse?[uences to many farmers themselves, f heavy inroads are made on the bees, all manner of crops, especially white clover, stand to lose out through poor fertilisation. The whole question involves grave issues which should be taken up by the proper authorities, whoever they might bfc.

MONTHLY WEATHER STATISTICS

The weather in September was generally exceptionally fine and warm throughout Canterbury, Marlborough, Nelson and the West Coast. Rainfall statistics for the month are as follows: South Canterbury, 1.23 inches in the Waimate areas in 7 days, with 9 frosts up to 8.2 degrees, and 1.40 in in 7 days in the Timaru area, with 4 frosts up to 3.4 deg. MidCanterbury, 1.74 in in 7 days, with 6 light frosts up to 8 deg. North Canterbury, 0.90 in in 10 days in the Christchurch area, with occasional frosts up to 5.8 deg. and 0.99 in in 6 days in the Loburn area, Marlborough, 1.28 in in 5 days, with 12 frosts up to 8.9 deg. Nelson, 1.491 n in 7 days, with occasional light frosts. Westport, 3.13 in in 13 days, conditions generally fine and mild to warm. Statistics for other parts of the West Coast are not available. U.S. BARS IMPORT OF RAM SEMEN

“An endeavour was made to export deep-frozen ram semen, following the request of an American sheep breeder to a local stud breeder in the district. Dr. James, of the Dairy Board, readily co-operated in collecting and handling semen from several rams of this breeder, and everything went smoothly but for the last-minute rejection of the application to import deep frozen ram semen into the United states by the American authorities, whose reasons were not stated,’’ runs a passage in the annual report of the North Canterbury Farmers’ Veterinary Club. The report also mentions that “since sponsorship by the club, artificial breeding, run under the auspices of the Herd Improvement Association, made a satisfactory start with the establishment of a winter mating group. The direct gain from the lift in production of better bred cattle through using artificial breeding services must appeal to every farsighted dairyman.’’

SOME LIVESTOCK PROBLEMS

“An interesting outbreak of broken legs in ram hoggets occurred in the winter. Two similar outbreaks occurred in other parts of Canterbury during the year. Some hoggets had all bones broken in each leg. This condition was found to be associated with copper deficiency, but has not been recorded in copper-deficient sheep previously”—extract from annual report of the North Canterbury Farmers’ Veterinary Club. The report also notes that “white muscle disease was evident again on some properties, and on two the incidence was high. It appears that very young lambs grazing on clover, lucerne or rich pastures grown on silt loam country are likely to be affected. Fortunately the response to vitamin E drenching is rapid. Referring to fly strike the report says: “Considering the very great improvements in methods of fly-strike control which have been made possible in recent years, the generally practised method of fly-strike treatment and prevention are rather antiquated. The moat satisfactory treatments contain D.D.T. and Gammexane in non-irritant solutions, and the long lasting protection of the new insecticide Dieldrin is sufficient to make every sheepfarmer re-evaluate his methods of fly-strike prevention and treatment and bring them up-to-date. Fly-strike is an insidious problem, and of greater importance than Is generally realised.’*