THE WORLD'S CATTLE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume II, Issue 27, 25 November 1879, Page 2

THE WORLD'S CATTLE.

An English journal, in an article on the cost of meat in England! and the supply, has the following in relation to the stock of some of the more important pastoral regions of the ' earth as follows : — . t Oruguay, the population of which by the last census of 1876 was 4oo,ooo souls, possessed at the same time 4,873,924 head of horned cattle and 9,142,135 sheep, but as those figures are taken from the returns made by the farmers themselves for the pur% pose of taxation, M. Vitalba, comptroller of the state, considers the more accurate numbers would be 6,000,000 and 12,000,000. The Argentine Confederation, far larger in extent, with barely 2,000,000 of inhabitants, had, according to a publi- . cation published at Buenos .Ayres,^ in 1876, 13,493,090 animal&~o£y||fl bovine species, of which 5,116,uz^^ were in the province of Buenos Ayres, and 57,546 413 sheep. But according to the official announcement in the Argentine section of the exnibition in 1878, the real quantities were 89,000,000 of sheep.and 15,000,000 of horned cattle. A vast extent of the southern portion of Brazil, particularly the province of Rio Grande, Bolivia, and portions of Peru on the eastern slopes of the Andes, are also occupied in raising cattle, but the difficulties of procuring definite returns are so great that any estimate inudo could ouly be mere guess work. Turning now to North America, where immense districts are almost' wholly pastoral, the figures published in 1872 by Mr Block showed the existence of 26,693,305 head of oattle, 31,679,300 sheep, and 32,000,000 of pigs* Hut these numbers have vastly increased since, owing to the extensive trade which has sprung up between England and the United States in meat, both salt and fresh. Accord*^" ing to some statistics published by the French minister of commerce, Canada possessed in 1876, 2,924;296 animals of the bovine race and 3,155,509 of the ovine. The numbers supposed to exist in Australia and New Zealand are 5,995,672 of the former and 61,649,967 of the latter, of which the share of New South Wales is 3,1 31,013 cattle. 25,629,755 sheep, as well as 173,604 pigs. Finally, Kngland's enormous colony in the South of Africa is, speaking generally, devoted to raising cattle, and although no accurate returns are forthcoming, the fact is known that this industry is extending there daily.