LUPIN AS STOCK FOOD

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 30 March 1929, Page 3

LUPIN AS STOCK FOOD

POSSIBILITIES IN POOR-LANDS

DEFIES DROUGHT. IMPROVES THE

With a big area of light pumice hind undeveloped in the centre of the North Island and numerous ureas of poor grazing land ranging from sand and gravel flats to .shingly ranges, New Zealand farmers are naturally very interested in any herbage or plants which will bring this kind .into profit (writes "Sundowner" in the Auckland "Star"). Where: .such areas are ploughable and wifliiu reach of railways or good roads, it is possible to improve the land by growing and ploughing in green manure and by top-dressing, but many situations have not these advantages, and the only hope of improving them would seem to lie iu the direction of establishing- on them some fodder plant or grass which, while demanding little from the soil would provide fodder for sheep or cattle. For many yearn hipin, sometimes spelt lupine, has been used on the west coast of this island to reclaim areas of drifting sand along the coast, and in the South Island, particularly in Nelson, both blue and white lupin has been successfully grown as a fodder for sheep on poor country. Other than in these instances little cultivation oE the lupin family, in which there are upwards of 150 varieties,, has been attempted in the Dominion, although it holds great promise of being made a, useful fodder plant.

EARLY HISTORY IN WESTERN

AUSTRALIA

In Western Australia, about 70 years ago, a penal station was established at a place called Lynton, about 350 miles north of ' Perth, and lupin seed was planted in order to provide food for the prisoners. The settlement was abandoned and no more was heard about lupins for many years. » Then within tho present century curious-looking plants were observed growing wild on sandy, soils near the coast. Wheat growers-feared it might be a new and dangerous weed, and hoed and pulled up every specimen they could 'find. Then someone came along who identified it as the blue lupin, and reported that it was a valuable stock food. Landholders on all types of soil encouraged it, and to-day it is to be found well distributed over an area 100 miles long and 30 miles "broad, says a writer in the "Leader." Tests are now being made with lupin throughout Western Australia, and wherever the summer rainfall is scanty it appears to establish itself satisfactorily.

It is certain that if white or blue lupin could be established in our poorer pumice lands it would help to build up the soil in organic matter and nitrogen, and at the same time —if the Western Australian experience can be accepted as a criterion—would provide excellent grazing for both cattle and sheep.

PECULIARITIES OE GERMINATION

Liko numerous other-pod-hearing plants and bushes lupin has a picturesque way of distributing itself. In the summer, when conditions are favourable, the pods burst with the force of a tiny explosion, and the seeds arc hurled to distances of about half a chain in every direction. Germination takes place after early autumn rains, but to assure that the race shall he continued, a percentage of the seeds has a thicker casing than tho majority of them. Tims it has been proved that seeds will lie on or in the ground without germinating for several years, and will eventually produce a plant. Moreover, the seeds are hardy, and take a lot of killing. It has been demonstrated that after a light rain a seed will throw out a tiny root which may fail to connect with the soil, and it apparently dies, but after the next rain new roots are thrown out, and they too have been known to die only to be replaced by others when an abundant rain saturates the soil.

The experience of Messrs W. R. and J. Patrick, who farm a property of 6000 acres at Northampton, West Australia, may be of interest. They decided to test the stock-feeding value of lupins five years ago, and at different stages have had up to 1000 acres under crop.

The seed was sown through a drill in strips a chain wide, each strip being from one to two chains from its neighbour. The plants covered the vacant strips in three years. In 1927 the paddock (700 acres) carried ICOO sheep for eight months, although the original carrying capacity was less than a sheep to two acres. Further experience has convinced tho brothers that a better way is to sow the whole area through a- cultivator with seed box, at tho rate of 4 to 51b per acre, sowing a cover crop of oats with lewt of super at the same time. The oats make a good cover crop, and in the following season there is a- stand of lupins equal to thatobtained by tho earlier method in three years. METHOD OF GRAZING The plants must not be fed off'for about six weeks; if sheep arc let in earlier there is a probability that they will nip off the young shoots which will not grow again. When the lupin is six to nine inches high it is quite safe to stock. Where the plant has been established for a few years a good showing of ' grasses and trefoils appear which would indicate that the soil is benefiting from the introduction of nitrogen and humus. When 'the lupins have reached the flowering stage the stock are removed until the seed has firmed, when the chief grazing period begins. Lupin seed provides good summer feed, a matter of great .importance in a country, like West Australia, which beeoniesU'tibno" dry, and which grows grasses of low feeding value at that stage. During the seven or eight months of summer the lupin fields, according to Messrs Patrick, will carry from four to five sheep per acre, the stock feeding almost entirely on the seeds. Seed which' falls is picked up by the sheep, which, "will even paw the surface soil in<ordei' to get beans which may be covered. It is this covering of the seed by tramping which insures a good strike in the'following year. Sometimes sheep may eat a portion of the stall", but cattle" or horses like it better. I Lupin,roots, pulled, up .are found to have adhering'to them nitrogen nodules as big as beans, hence the renovating chert'on the soil must be very marked, while the amount of humus produced. i both directly by the plant and by the large number of sheep carried, is hound to be considerable. . Time is no fear r-f lupins becoming a troublesome weed, for thev arc readily killed bv ploughing when a few inches high, vr unrestricted .storking with cattle i.r sheen will eradicate them in a Lupins are being largely grown at present by orchnrdists in the drier parts of Hawkos Day, for turning under as grcn manure, which builds up the nitrogen and humus content of the soil, and at- the same time helps to conserve the soil nn istr.ro through dry summers. There would seem To bo possibilities in this plant also for (he sheen farmer. even en what is considered, lo be fairlv good land in (he North Island.