FARM NOTES FROM ENGLAND.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 9477, 5 April 1894, Page 6

FARM NOTES FROM ENGLAND.

[BY OUR ENGLISH AGRICULTURAL TORRES- ' ,;.'4 ~ PONDENT.] 4 . ■ - ••»•*»,>' • . y. London, February. 9.; , AN AGREEABLE DISAPPOINTMENT. The winter is.nearly, over, as far as the season is governed by the calendar, and the trials which it was expected to bring upon farmers, have been altogether escaped. Of course, as usual, a severe winter. was predicted, either because berries were plentiful, or for some other equally superstitious reason; but experience has shown, as once more the utter futility of weather predictions for more than a day or two ahead. The idea that a great crop of berries on the hawthorn and other shrubs is a harbinger of a severe winter, is based on the theory that Providence provides, food for the birds in this way. It ought to be so, . people think, and therefore :it must be so. But how can. the conditions in the spring which control the fruiting of shrubs have anything to do with the temperature of the succeeding winter? The fact is that there nearly always is a great crop of berries, and so the prediction based upon it is devoid of all shadow of substantiation, a very severe winter in this country being a comparative rarity. At any rate,, we have enjoyed one of the mildest winters ever known. Grass has hardly ceased togrow, since the autumn, and turnips left in the fields for spring feed have grown also. Consequently, instead of farmers having exhausted their scanty stores of hay and mangolds, as it was feared they would have done by this time, they have made smaller inroads upon them than the oldest of them have ever made before. It was expected, too, that they would have been pub to an . extra expense for purchased cake and corn for feeding their stock, whereas they never spent less. Cattle have been kept largely upon the pastures all through the winter, and partly upon the excellent crops of turnips, a very large breadth of which was sown in anticipation of scarcity. Sheep, too, have been kept mainly upon turnips, grass, and straw chaff. Of course, both classes of animals have had cake or corn, but both less than usually. We are not " out of the wood " yet, however, for there is plenty of time ahead for a long spell of wintry weather, and for that reason a frost now would be welcome to keep vegetation in check, lest it should make a great advance, only to be cub off later on. THE LORDS AND THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BILL. For once the farmers of this country have reason to be thankful that we have a House of Lords. Their interests and the barestjuaticeto them were quite disregarded by the triumphant Radical majority in the House of Commons in connection with this Bill. As a Radical myself on many questions, I write withoub par by feeling; bub "Agriculture first and party afterwards" has always been my motto as a journalist, and the treatment of farmers and landowners by the men who want to catch the votes of the agricultural labourers is outrageously unfair. As the Local Government Bill lefb the Commons, ib empowered little majorities of labourers who pay no rates to double the rates at their pleasure, and compel the landlords farmers, and cottage-owners other than landlords to provide the money for all kinds of real or supposed improvements in our villages. The mischief is that hardly any cottage tenants pay rates, there being a lav? which enables local authorities to compel the owners of cottages to compound for the rates upon them,® Ib is conbended bhab the tenants pay the rates indirectly, and so they may whore cottages are let at commercial rents; bub in the rural districts most of the cottages are let either rent free, in parb payment of wages, or ab such nominal rents as Is to Is 6d per week. These rents have been unaltered for generations, while the rates have gone up and down ; which is a clear proof that the occupiers have not paid the rates. Again, the Bill, as ib left the Commons, empowered little majorities of labourers (four or five voters in many cases) to purchase or hire coinpulsorily any piece of land which they mighb fancy to let out in allotments or email holdings ; the purchase price or rent to be fixed by valuation. The only stipulation by way of safeguard was the assent of the local Government Board, and we know what thab would be worth if a general election happened to be near. Now, the labourers (a majority in every parish) would be certain to fix upon the ' best field or pasture close to a village, which is the most valuable portion of the farm of which it forms part; and many a poor tenant-farmer would be crippled in his business by having such land taken from him. Any farmer will be able to judge of the serious loss which a man would suffer if the pasture close to his homesteadan invaluable convenience in relation to live stockwere taken from him. These are only two of many most unfair provisions in the Bill which the Lords have had the courage to amend. Compulsory purchases of land hitherto have had to be sanctioned by Parliament in each instance before becoming valid, and. thab safeguard, removed by the Commons, has been restored by the Lords. In some points the Lords have gone further than was, necessary, and in all probability the Government will rather drop their measure than accept it in its amended form. But possibly a compromise will be effected.

ANTHRAX, An excellent paper on "Anthrax " was read ab this week's meeting of the London Farmers' Club by Professor J. Worbley Axe, and a summary of the principal points of it deserve attention. The disease is of immemorial existence, and is found in al parts of the world. The virus of the disease the anthrax bacillus, is now generally regarded as one of the lower fungi. It consists of an elongated mass of vegetable albumen enclosed in a thin transparent case, ibs shape being that of a minute rodso minute, it is supposed, that its diameter is not more than one 25,000 th of an inch, so that a powerful microscope is required bo distinguish it. Ib possesses marvellous powers of reproduction, depending upon the conditions in which ib is placed. In the blood, each little rod, after rapidly increasing in length, divides' into short segments, each of which is a separate organism. The elongation and division are repeated until the disorganisation of the blood and the blocking of vessels resulb in the death of the victim. Bub ib is when outside the body of an animal that the organism becomes dangerous to others, for only when exposed to the air does it produce spores. These spores often live for a long time in manure, on the surface of a pasture, or buried in the soil, developing into bacilli, when circumstances of temperature and moisture are favourable. Now, the difficulty of dealing with this disease is shown, not only by the multiform means by which ib can be disseminated, bub also by the inapplicability of the method of "stamping out" which is effectual with cattle plague or pleuro-pneumonia. Infection may be conveyed in wool, hides, hair, bones, grain, seeds, fodder, and the grass which grows in pasture. The virus enters an animal almost exclusively in food or water, and therefore the slaughter of animals in contact with diseased ones is useless. But the destruction of diseased animals is of the utmost importance ; only care must be taken not to allow them to bleed, and to destroy their carcases by burning them. Hitherto burial has been practised ; bub this is dangerous. Professor Axe recommends poisoning with pruasic acid and cremation. Diseased animals infect pastures and fields in which they feed, as the anthrax bacillus can live and reproduce itself outside the animal body. This is why it is so dangerous to slaughter animals affected with anthrax in the ordinary way. Equally dangerous in this connection is the common practice of herdsmen and shepherds of bleeding animals when they are ill. As to selling them for food when they are affected with anthrax, ib is a wicked proceeding, as the lives of the men who kill the Animals or handle the carcases are thus endangered, bo say nothing of the people who eat the meab. When the disease breaks oub in a herd or flock, ib is usual to send the apparently healthy animals into a fresh field or pasture; bub to do this without precautions is dangerous, nob only because there may be infected animals among those which do not show sings of the disease, bub also because they may all carry the virus on their hoofs, and infeebfresh land. No doubt ib is desirable to ; remove the healthy from the place of infection, bub their feet should be cleansed and soaped with some antiseptic solution, or dusted over with ohlorido of lime. The animal

should then be transferred to a yard or shod thinly littered and sprinkled freely with a eolation ' of perchloride of mercury. They should •' further be examined , daily by & veterinary surgeon, and any freshly diseased animal should be taken from the rest and destroyed. If, after six ' day's, no further Case of disease has occurred, the animals may be removed from the yard or shed having been again disinfected. ; With respect to vaccination, which Pasteur has introduced as a preventive 'to anthrax, with varying degrees of success, Professor Axe has hopes of it, but points, out that, owing to the imperfect cultivation of the vaccine in some cases, the disease has been propagated by the very means taken to prevent it.