FOR THE FARMER.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XX, Issue 2062, 3 January 1925, Page 2

FOR THE FARMER.

AGRICULTURAL ITEMS. Topdressing should start when the pasture is still good. The farmer must use discretion as ! to the quantity of fertiliser to apply. Pigs grazed on pastures produce a more palatable flesh and firmer bacon. Thistles and other troublesome weeds should be mown early. Keep the pastures clean. Stock should be kept oil' the topdressed area for a week or two after i applying the fertiliser, j The only argument in favour of the j scrub cow is that it takes less time to milk her. The profitable rule is to sow mangels in rotation, say once in lour years, or to plough a new area from lea for this crop. Wherever “soilage" is practised, a j succession of crops must be carefully i planned so that a continuous supply > of green forage of the proper stage i of maturity may be available over the period desired. Ammonia top-dressing should be applied to the hay paddocks. This dressing will greatly increase the yield, and if applied immediately after the first cut of clover, will produce a profitable second cut. As a preventive of the maggot-fly striking on sheep, probably the best results follow spraying or saturation with a solution of dipping-powder, taking care that the dip reaches to the skin by using a powerful spray pump. ECONOMY IN DAIRYING. Perhaps the greatest economy that can be carried cut on a dairy farm is in the direction of making the herd produce more without increasing the number. A standard of production should be set up. A dairy farmer might say to himself, “Any cow 'that does not bring in t2O per annum is not worth keeping.” A cow is a machine for producing milk. If a manufacturer has a machine which, in spito of oiling and cleaning and careful driving, will not produce as much as n newer machine, lie promptly discards it in favour of the improved article. So the cow that will not respond to careful feeding and shelter must be culled out. The farmer is not compelled to make a sudden change. By the expenditure of £SO or £IOO for a good bull, with a milking pedigree behind him. in a few years the herd may be worked up into a more payable proposition. In an American town, the bankers and business men formed a "better-bull association.” They sent away for a few hundred bulls and disposed of them to the dairy farmers on easy terms, more hulls being purchased as the instalments on 'former loans came in. As business men they recognised that the easiest way to meet low prices was to increase i he production per cow. DOES THUNDER SOUR MILK? •It is a popular belief that thunderstorms sour milk, a belief so widespread that it would seem there must be some foundation for it. II is questionable, however, whether there is really any connection between flic thunderstorm and the souring of milk. That souring frequently occurs during - n Thunderstorm, however, cannot be doubted.

After much experimenting with electric sparks, etc., scienksts have come to the conclusion that bacteria grow most rapidly in the warm, sultry conditions which usually precede a thunderstorm, and it will frequently happen that the thunderstorm and the souring occur together-, not because the thunder has hastened the souring, hut rather because the climatic conditions which have brought the .storrn have m the same time been such as to cause unusually rapid bacterial growth. During hot, dose weather, even when there is no thunder, ii is just as difficult, to keep milk as it is during thunderstorms, and scrupulous cleanliness in regard to the milk vessels is a good remedy against souring during a storm. It is safe to conclude, therefore, that in all cases it is the bacteria which sour the milk, and if there seems to he a casual connection between souring and thunder it is an indirect one only. Milk should he cooled as soon as possible after milking, when it will keep sweet for a reasonable period, while milk deprived of bacteria will keep well during thunderstorms, MANURING FOR MILK. EXPERIMENTS ENGLAND. The Staffordshire Farm Institute started last year some experiments in manuring the land for milk production. The field selected had been mown for hay annually for a large number of years, and druing that tune neither farmyard nor artificial manure had been applied. The soil of the field is a light sand, freely drained, and overlying the Keuper marl. In the herbage leguminous plants were negligible in quantity, and the most frequent grasses were bents, sweet vernal, tall oat grass, and Yorkshire fog (holcus lanatus) —species which are of little value for grazing. The , surface of the soil was covered wilidj a fairly dense mat of plants and local experience in the of this class of land has

liming is a necessary preliminary to rapid improvement by manuring. The field, comprising ten and a third acres, was limed on January 24, 1923, with “small” lime at the rate of two tons per acre. It was divided into three plots, and the manure applied on April 10th. Plot A was manured with 4cwt superphosphate 30 per cent per acre, at a cost of 12a per acre. Plot B had no manure, and plot C load 4cwt superphosphate and lewt of sulphate of potash per acre, the cost per acre being 265. The grazing season commenced on May 12 and lasted until September 15—a period of 18 weeks. At the commencement of the experiment two cows were allotted to each plot. After the first month’s grazing it was decided that the plots could carry a heavier weight of stock, so an additional cow was added to each of plots A and B and two extra to plot C. This stock was carried for eight weeks, when a reduction had to be made. The original six cows were left on their respective plots, but on Plot € one of the two extra cows was left in addition. During the eight weeks when ten cows were employed on the experiment the stock was rotated from plot to plot in threes, the fourth cow on plot C remaining on that plot until the experiment was completed for the season. In a report on the trial issued by Mr J. C. Rushton, Principal of the Farm Institute, the results of this grazing season are announced as follows: Plot A, total milk produced, 870 gallons; plot B, BSI gallons; plot C. 1072 gallons. The increase on the plot where sulphate of potash was used in addition to superphosphate was 201 gallons, or 60 per acre; whereas plot A (superphosphate only) showed no superiority over the nomanure plot B—indeed, fell somewhat short. Throughout the summe* observations of the herbage all tended to bear out tho figures obtained. No diflerenco was noticed between pint A and plot B, but plot C looked greatly improved. On (his plot there was abundant growth of both rod and white clovers, plants which were absent from the other plots. The results, it is stated, all tend to eonfirm earlier experiments in Staffordshire on the manuring of meadow land on tight soils—namely, that animations of phosphatie manures by themselves do nol effect any material improvement. A MAN’S VALUE TO HIS COMMUNITY. Elbert Hubard said: “Men are valuable just in proportion as they arc willing to work in harmony with othe v men.” Hubbard recognisied that man is a social being. 110 comes to liis highest development as a member of Iho community. Notice, however, the emphasis Unit L put upon the phrase, “'Willing lu work in harmony with other men.’’ There must ho tho will to work m harmony with obher men. AVo are reminded of the old adage, “Where there’s a will there’s a way.” The giositesl <«f all struggles, i>s to engender in the heaths of men a. willingness to co-opernto wMt each other The value of sport to a community is summed up in the' training it. gives to its devotees, in the apj of working in harmony with their fellows.

The moral is easy to point. Fanners get nowhere when, they tight individually. When every fanner is willing to work wilts ills fellow farmers the battle is half over.—Queensland Producer.