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Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 212, 4 June 1929, Page 5

No one has yet lifted the £lO,OOO offered, by the Government for something that would eradicate the blackberry. The goat is the best that has yet been found. Writing in the “New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology,” Mr. E. F. Northcroft says that too sudden results should not be expected from the attack by the goats on the blackberry bushes. But in time they manage to feed right into the centre of blackberry masses, reducing once healthy bushes to a mass of tangled bare canes, new shoots, as soon as they make their appearance being immediately nibbled off. The great difficulty found in attempting to concentrate goats on any area of blackberry Was that as soon as food became short they would wander into adjacent blocks in search of more blackberry, and no matter what precautions were taken, it was almost impossible, without incurring considerable expense, to erect a fence which would keep the goats enclosed. In spite of the surprising prejudice on the part of some farmers to goats, they were, without doubt, the cheapest means of controlling blackberry, and, if properly used and managed, all the usual objections, such as slow breeding, etc., were completely .overcome. Further, that if goats were used in conjunction with top-dressing experiments of the proper kind, no farmer could use the arguments that goats reduced the carrying capacity of the land, but that under proper conditions goats could be run with increased stocking.