FARMS AND FARMERS

Greymouth Evening Star, 23 February 1937, Page 9

FARMS AND FARMERS

ITEMS OF INTEREST

(By

“Rouseabout”)

TREATMENT OF SHEEP DOGS. ENGLISH VISITOR SHOCKED Shocked at the method of feeding and the kennel management adopted by a large number of sheep dog owners in New Zealand, an English visitor, Captain J. E. Bradish-Ellames, comments strongly in a letter to the Auckland “Star.” His allegations that the dogs arc ill-fed ahd unlit are supported by an Auckland man with long years of experience of sheep and cat-

tle dogs in the Dominion. “I have greatly enjoyed my visit ot six weeks to New Zealand, ’, states Captain Bradish-Ellames’ letter. “I have admired the wonderful scenery and met many delightful people. Before I depart I feel I must add a protest to previous ones at the treatment of the New Zealand sheep dog. I was very shocked when. I discovered the method of feeding and the kennel management adopted by a large numbei of sheep dog owners. I have discussed the subject with many people. Some are just as disgusted as I am myself; others try to justify the system'. “Surely no sensible man or woman would back a racehorse which had been shut up in its box since its last race and had had to eat a few musty oats and its bedding? But the shepherd, whose very existence depends on his dogs, asked these animals to perform duties demanding both speed and stamina in a totally ill-fed and unfit condition. I know he argues that a dog works better in light condition, but there is a happy medium which* is admirably /demonstrated by fox-' hounds, shooting dogs and sheep dogs in the United Kingdom. To me it is un-British.

" “We place ourselves as a race far above any other in our love and knowledge of animals, and here in a British Dominion is found a state of affairs worthy only of the Latin races. One hears and reads a great deal about the disease hydatids. Surely this disease could be greatly eliminated by more careful and regular feeding of the sheep dog. I cannot believe there are not a great many men and, women in New Zealand who could spend a little time, and even a little money, on educating the shepherds. “Owners of sheep stations who employ their own shepherds could do most of all, if only they had the will. A little trouble and a little organisation could produce the necessary daily meal and exercise for every sheep dog in the Dominion.”

“There are strong grounds for the charges levelled by Captain BradishEllames against many sheep and cattle farmers, drovers and shepherds,” remarked a man who has spent years in inspecting New Zealand farms. “Considering that not a hoof of our flocks and herds could be properly moved and handled on the farms and on the . roads without the dogs, and considering the amazingly high standard - of work demanded of them, their treatment too often is a disgrace.

“The same soft methods used with city or house dogs are not expected for the working dogs. Discipline and unquestioning obedience are all-im-portant. But the brutal floggings, the wretched housing and the poor and insufficient food which too often fall to the lot of the working dog are impossible to defend or understand.” CAVES AS KENNELS. Within 50 miles of Auckland, continued the critic, he had seen a team of dogs whose only shelter from cold and winter storms was in small caves excavated from a clay bank. There they were continuously chained, except when required to work, fed sparsely once a day, and forced to drink water out of a dirty tin. Further stories of callous treatment of sheep dogs were recounted. He had seen, said the critic, a man from a city snap his fingers at a sheep dog on a country road. The friendly beast had run over eagerly and jumped up. Without comment and with the greatest unconcern, the owner of the dog, a drover, had taken his gun and shot the animal. The dog was no good to him. It was not a “one man” dog. “I have seen dogs flogged unmercifully for minor breaches of discipline,” concluded the critic. “I have known of dogs left unfed and uncared for while the owners have been on holiday for days at a time. Of course, there is. the other side to the story—the more enlightened farmer whose dogs are decently housed, well fed and in perfect condition. Even so, I am afraid that our English visitor is right.”

“If incidents such as these referred to are known, it is the duty of members of the public to report them to the nearest constable or inspector of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals,” remarked Mr. J. J. Hollingworth, inspector of the Auckland branch of the S.P.C.A., when the above remarks were referred to him. He admitted that periodically bad cases of ill-treatment came under the notice of the society, but he did not believe that people who maltreated sheep or cattle dogs were in the majority. However, there was room for improvement. It was pointed out by Mr. Hollingworth that under the Police Offences Act there was a section devoted to cruelty to animals which provided for heavy fines and imprisonment up to six months. Although the clause did not define cruelty, there was a clause which bad a wide application, and which could be interpreted in a variety of ways by a magistrate.

•REFUSE TO GAS RABBITS Manx farmers refused recently to co-operate in a poison gas campaign to exterminate rabbits. A circular asking the farmers whether they would agree to this method being used on the island to get rid of the rabbits, which are said to be increasing rapidly, was sent out by the Manx Board of Agriculture. Replies received were ten to one against the proposal. Several farmers have pointed out that rabbits are wholesome food for many people, and they do not favour their wholesale destruction in this way. They have stated that poison gas could be much more usefully employed against rats, which do more damage.

HENS OVER-BRED. FARMERS’ HEAVY LOSSES. The search for the super-hen, who will lay an egg every day, has been suspended (says the agricultural correspondent of the London ‘ Daily Telegraph”). Poultry farmers have found that breeding for laying qualities has seriously undermined the stamina of many strains. For the past dozen years breeders have concentrated on creating stock which is more and more prolific. Hens were bred which began to lay before they were live months old and produced 200, 250 and even 300 eggs in their first laying year. But now poultry farmers have decided that it is high time to call a halt. These heavy-laying strains are worn out. They have been so developed for their laying qualities that their stamina has gone. No longer can the pullets be reared without heavy losses. The chicks have no resisting power to attacks of coccidiosis, an ailment which can attack all forms of birds. Fowl paralysis, a little-understood disease which may be related to cancer, is very prevalent. Tuberculosis is also taking a heavy toll.

I have been visiting farms known to me a few years ago as quite prosperous whose owners were creating good businesses. Some of these are now facing ruin. One farmer, with good plant and land, told me that of the 2,000 pullets he set out to rear for this winter laying season, only 400 remain, and these are proving poor 'producers. ( Some of our best English breeds have been largely ruined by the craze for high egg yields. The White Leghorn, for instance, which until a few years ago was making such wonderful records, became undersized and short of stamina. Only now is it regaining its prestige through more careful breeding. A similar threat was made to the popular Rhode Island Red. I am told, however, that a halt may have been called in time to prevent this hardy breed from becoming decadent. The Southern poultry farmers are rather better off than those in the North. They are able to use movable houses and folds which prevent their land from becoming permanently infected by disease. Even so, their losses have been very heavy. A wet summer has contributed to the trouble, and has also meant that the young stock matured slowly and the pullets came into lay late. This explains why English eggs are dearer than they were at this time last year. The farmers are not reaping any benefit from these higher prices, for not only have they fewer eggs to sell, but their feeding costs have risen by 1/6 per cwt. THE KICKING COW. Kicking on the part of a milkingcow may be a vice or it may be an excuse, and it is the business of all intelligent stock handlers to find the true cause and, where possible correct it.

The fault; may have some definite reason or it may be disposition. It is sufficient to have only a small skin crack in one’s own hand or finger to realise the sensitiveness of the cow whose sore teat is being manipulated during the milking process.

Where a cow in such a condition kicks out, the action is instinctive, and in self-defence. As soon as the careful herd manager sees to it that such cracks are healed up the kicking will cease. There is the type of cow whose make-up results in. her kicking simply to relieve her own feelings. The animal showing signs of such a disposition must be treated at all costs with unruffled patience if she is to be turned into a contented milker. Such herd members are of the nervous, irritable sort, and if wrongly handled will become habitual kickers and a loss, so far as dairying profit is concerned. With a kicker of this type it is as often as not an effective plan to give at milking time a picking of some feed to which she is particularly partial to divert her attention from the pail-filling operations. Should this stratagem be ineffective and leg-roping be resorted to, all temptation to retributive violence on the part of the handler must be resisted, for harsh treatment in any form will increase the kicking propensity and lessen the chance of improving the kicking type into a settled milkingtype. The cow that despite all firm but kindly treatment, persists in the habit to an extent that suggested permanent viciousness should be disposed of in the same way as that decided on in the case of any unsatisfactory milker—by being fattened up for sale to the butcher.

QUAINT ENGLISH NAMES. We lived at Scotland Farm, so called because it used to be “scot free” of rates, says a writer in the “Farmers’ Weekly.” Near-by were farms named Egypt, Canada. World’s End and Penny well. The latter derived its name from the well (still there to-day) where people came in the olden days and bought water at Id a bucket.

At the top of the lane is Marrowbone Castle —just a cottage. “Hare Street” Lane (or “Harley Street” as some people say) is a muddy lane, adjoining “Paradise.” Doggit, Crowcroft, and Baggerbush are all lanes near, and at Cuckoo pen several fields unite.

Fiddlers’ Green, a small piece t>f land on the Severn bank, was a rendezvous of the olden days when fiddlers came across Severn and played for money.

Here are some local names for Gloucestershire meadows that seem to us unusual: Ox-leason, Coneygree. Old Shrew, Half-yard, Folly Field, Chapel Withys, Pcddenhams. Honey Bulls, Pound Close, Devil’s Shelter, Dragon's Hole, Puck Piece Parson's Coppice, Vicar’s Ground. Idle Meadow, Gooseham, Swimpit. Oxgraft, Hay-Way-Rag-piece, Tally-110-Close. Cinque-foil. Buttermilk Piece, Slingates, and Shoulder of Mutton Piece.

Chaigrave, Oxfordshire, has a field called Sixpenny Piece, while another is called "The Mouse Trap." A cottage at Rofford in Hie same

parish, is called "Black Jack" to this day, because here, tradition, says, people from London came during the plague, and died from it, and were buried. The adjoining field is called “The Lepers' Ground”; the tithe on which is

still paid to the Vicar of Wheetfield, although it is not in his parish—two other parishes lie between them. But it is paid to Wlieetfield’s Vicar because the incumbent there at the time of the plague was the only one who would visit the sufferers at Black Jack.