Farm and Garden.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 423, 20 March 1880, Page 25

Farm and Garden.

On the authority of the Taranaki Herald we lqam the low price of grasa seed haß a tendency to lessen trade in more ways than one. The local matrimonial market suffers by it in no small degree, for several of the Taranaki single young farmers were anticipating the returns yielded by their seed as a means to enable them to commence housekeeping. IN drying apples no machine is required ; the process is most simple. Pare, quarter, cut out core ; expose them on boards or iron to sun, and in three days they will be dry. When on breaking a piece it is seen that the white has all turned a light brown, they can be taken in and packed away for winter use, when they make an uncommonly good pie, or eat well, as vegetable, with meat. Apples so dried may not look so nice as the American sample, but are equally guod. The Italian Minister of Agriculture gives an account of experiments which have been made at the Experimental Station at Florence, to the effect that butter, purposely not freed from buttermilk, kept perfectly sweet for upwards of three months by the addition of about 8 per cent, of borax. It Is stated that the borax should be dry, in fine powder, and thoroughly mixed with the butter. The American Agriculturist says—After long coaxing with no little use of the whip, we have seen a balky horse started by putting a lump of earth in its mouth. The mind of the animal seems to be set on not going, and the point to be gained is to divert it from the idea entertained, and this the earth in the mouth does effectually. So soon as the horse gives its attention to the getting of the earth out of its mouth, it forgets its balkiness, and can be started.

The potato crop in Australia promises to be very good. Everything has been in their favor this season, and they are now a picture. The problem—What shall we do with them ? is beginning to afflict growers. With five tons per acre there would be 20,000 tons to get rid of ; but if no unforeseen calamity intervene there will be few crops so low as five tons per acre. They may, therefore go up to 30,000, and it will take a lot of eating to get over that quantity, Adelaide can absorb 10,000 or 12,000 tons. It will be necessary to open up markets or the balance.

A very good plan of preserving grapes is adopted by some private gardeners ; as soon as the grapes begin to color the bunches are enclosed in paper—good newspaper or white-y----brown paper. The trouble of making bags is saved by wrapping paper around the bunch, putting one tie around the stalk and another below the point of the bunch. Some growers leave the paper open at the bottom—it is thus bell-shaped. Sparrows, it is said, do not enter at the opening, but where "silver eyes" appear annually they are not so easily scared. Grapes thus treated do not ripen quite so early as those left open, but as the season, is thus prolonged for several week?, private families find it advantageous rather than otherwise. At a meeting of the unemployed held near London in January, the question of emigration was discussed. According to a report in an English paper, " Mr. A. Ciayden suggested that New Zealand was a land flowing with milk and honey, and that several Oxfordshire laborers whom he had known had grown fat on the milk, and were now surfeited with the honey. When, however, it was suggested that town laborers ' didn't know a plough from a cauliflower,' Mr. Ciayden was not so certain that the detritus of the town population would so easily absorb either the milk or the honey." It would be well if similar were made at other meetings of the kind. A new fodder plant (Reana luxurians) has been introduced in New South Wales. It is a native of Guatemala, and wa3 first introduced into Cape Colony in 1872, and was tried in various parts of the south of France with considerable success, the plants growing to a height of i 0 feet, and each plant throwing 50 or more stems. Mr. Charles Ayres, seedsman and florist of St. George-street, Cape Town, impressed with the value of the article as a new fodder grass, is widely distributing the seed. By the Cuzco, which called at the Cape, a packet of this seed was brought to the colony by the Rev. Dr. Corlette, D.D., and placed at the disposal of the committee of the Western Suburbs Horticultural Society, and one of the recipients of the seed, who sowed it in the beginning of December, report that he has between 30 and 40 plants well developed, and promising to confirm the description of it in Mr. Ayres's circular. The plants referred to are most luxuriant, and some of them already evidence the fact that it is no exaggeration to say that they throw out 50 or more stems from a root. The quality of the fodder is good, somewhat of the character of young maize, soft and succulent, very sweet, and evidently greatly relished, as proved by experiment, by all stock. It would appear to produce a heavier crop than sorghum, and not being so fibrous or cany, should be preferable for feed purposes. Mr. Ayres says, " Cattle of all kinds feed greedily upon it." One of our subscribers at Ashfield, who is experimenting with it, is confident that Reana luxurians is a valuable acquisition to the fodder resources f the colony.

A Coreespondent sends the Rangitihei anomalies, which at one time would have been thought paradoxical, but which, owing to the present exigencies of fortune, farmers are daily becoming accustomed to : —A bushel of wheat costs 45., and the millers will give you 421bs. of flour for it ; or charge you 19s. for lOOlbs. of flour, or not quite bushels of wheat, which, at 4s. per bushel are worth ] os. Moral : Grind your own wheat. Anomaly No. 2. —A laborer obtains 6s. per day for binding ; oats are sold for Bd. per bushel ; ergo, a binder thi3 last season was paid 9 bushels of oats for his day's wages. Moral.—Sell your farm and go to sea.

London Truth says : "The reduction in the value of land in England is not only permanent, but the decrease in value will augment in proportion as more and more land is devoted to agricultural purposes out of England, and as the means of transportation are faciliated. We are only at the commencement of the equalizing effect on value of land produced by cheap intercommunication. Why, in Hungary and Transylvania, fowls, fattened on maize, may be bought for 3d. in any numbers, and they might be brought to England in refrigerating waggons for about Id. apiece. To sell them, therefore, for 6d. each in London would return a handsome profit. And it is merely a question of time when these fowls will be seeu in our markets competing with the produce of our own farmyards." We received a few days since copies of the report of the ranger to the Taranaki Land Board, relative to improvements effected on deferred payment lands in the Moa and Huirangi districts, held under the Taranaki Waste Land Act, 1874. These .reports are s > favorable that we call particular attention to them as exemplifying what can be done by men of small means in the settlement and profitable occupation of laud, provided they will but exerci-ie the necessary industry. In the Huirangi district certain lands were sold under the deferred-payment system to a number of Germans and Danes in January, 1876. Mr. G. T. Robinson, the ranger, reports thus : " Within the four years that they have held the land—and although they have had to build houses and erect temporary fences—they have actually cleared on the average over 60 per cent, of their holdings, and after deducting the required amount to cover the fir.-'t inspection (made two years ago), they have made improvements to more than 5J times the amount required to cover the present inspection. There is not one defaulter in the block, and every holding but one i 8 occupied by a family. When it is considered that none of these settlers have been here more than five years, that they came here as immigrants, having absolutely no money of their own ; that since their arrival they have paid three instalments of the purchase money of their land ; that on. an average each one has made improvements on the land held by him to the value of over £l5O, and that while doing all this they have provided for their families, and in nearly all cases have purchased cows and raised stock ; it will, I think, be freely granted that they are the proper stamp of settlers to bring into a new • country, and especially into our bush districts." Referring to the Moa district he reports : " The total area of land sold on deferred payments on the portion I now report on is 2 57 acres. Of this, 51S acres have been cleared and grassed, or equa to twenty-five cent, of the whole ; the total value of improvements in clearing, building, and fencing, being £2363. Within the same poition of the district 56 8 acres have been sold for cash ; of which 961 acres have been cleared and grassed, or equal to 17 per cent ; the value of improvements, including clearing, being £7021 ; the total value of improvements on deferred payment and cash lauds now reported on being £9384. In the portion of the Moa district reported on in May last, the improvements made to that time were estimated at £7551. Since that time, and up to the present, quite £ISOO has been spent in building, fencing, and felling. These amounts, added to the estimate of the block I now report on—viz., £93B4—give a total of £18,435 as the value of improvements made on the portion of the Moa Block sold in 1875. These improvements, made within four years, in a district consisting entirely of bush lands (the timber bdng of the heaviest description), the roads being almost impassable for at least six months in the year, reflect great credit on the settlers in the district, and give promise that in the future this will become one of the most prosperous districts in the colony. It also speaks forcibly for the advantages of the deferred payment system, that in the large majority of cases the deferred payment allotments are held by laboring men (more than half of them immigrants, brought here during the past four years), who commenced improving their allotments in advance of the cash purchasers, and who in the majority of cases were the first to occupy their lands by actual residence."

PROFITABLE GRAIN-GROWING. Farmers in New Zealand and the Australian colonies pay but little heed to the demand that is likely to exist for their grain when it has been prepared for market, and they often suffer considerable losses in consequence. It is not the gross quantity of wheat and oats that is produced during a season to which we refer, but the preponderance of the one over the other. They appear to allow themselves to be guided by the prices which ruled during the preceding year, or which rule at the time of sowing, without any thought of the probabilities of the ensuing harvest, evidently taking it for granted that when oats have fetched a good price the one year, the market should be equally favorable during the next, and vice versa. The same thing is applied to wheat without any reference whatever to the world's market, which has of late been completely revolutionised by means of the rapid transit which railways on land and clipper vessels on water afford. Nor do they take into consideration the fact that there is a harvest every six months, the one south and the other north of the Equator. The outcome of this thoughtlessness has, as a rule, been that some v.ry abnormal conditions have been brought about. While the one harvest has yielded a quantity of oats which completely gutted the market, and brought this article down to such a low price that farmers had no margin of profit, that which followed has usually been a rush in the opposite direction ; and, although the price of wheat does not fluctuate sufficiently to leave no margin on an average crop,

owing to the pietty steady demand for it which exists in the Home market, an indirect loss generally comes in by arise in the price of oats. This rise sets the stone rolling in the opposite direction, and an extra acreage is put down in this crop, in the hope of finding an equally favorable market during the following season. The rotation of crops, of which, by the way, a great deal too much is made, has nothing whatever to do with this question, as, were each farmer to follow out the principle the quantity of wheat and oats would keep in nearly the same proportions to each other. A little foresight should do not a little to avoid losses from this cause. The European and North American harvests are gathered in the months of July and August, or at the latest September, or at about the time when New Zealand farmers are putting in their crops. With present mail communication—to say nothing of telegraphic —there is therefore no difficulty* in ascertaining the probable results in the northern hemisphere, and as a matter of fact, the colonial newspapers invariably contain alt the information on the subject that is required. A little attention to the prospects of the mirket at Home, should do a great deal to equalise the production, or to place it on an intelligent basis. Farmers should, have no difficulty in regulating their crops with a due regard to the probable demand, not so much in the local market as in that of Europe Under present circumstances the grain would be more on account of wheat than of oa's, as the former only is shipped Home, but we notice that a lot of oats is about to be sent by way of experim nt. The result may prove that a fair profit can be made. Should it be unfavorable, then it must be clear that the pro luct'on of oats must be limited to the demand in Australia and New Zealand. This, we have no hesitation in saying, has been areatly exceeded during the last two years. Wheat should in that case prove by far the most remunerative, or at any rate the most reliable, as the Home market would always be open to it. By regulating the crops to the probable demand, which we think we have shown cm be done without difficulty, farmers should be able to secure far better returns for their outlay than they do at present.

Mi UK ADULTERATION.

TO THE EDITOR OP THE NEW ZEALAND JUATL.

Sxr, —At the present time, when so many infantile diseases are terminating fatally, it will be perhaps not amiss to enquire into the causes and requisite remedies. Milk is not oily valuable in itself, but forms an indispensable article of daily food, and as thousands of infants' lives depend on it, should, therefore, be obtained unadulterated. The adulterations of milk consist of water, treayle, salt, anatto, starch, and cerebral matter. Water is, however, in the colonies the principal ingredient mixed with milk, and in the immense proportion of from ten to even fifty per cent. Hence the sky-blue color, flimsy appearance, and insipid flavor of milk deprived of its nutritious constituents, if not rendered totally unfit for human consumption. Milk is further deteriorated by the admixture of that from which cream has been extracted. Frequently zinc pans are employed in order to produce a good supply of cream. The writer of this has had considerable experince amongst the dairy farms in the suburb > of Wellington, and has observed that it is an almost universal practice of dairymen to scald the milk obtained at night, and after skimming the cream off in the morning mix it with the new milk obtained from the cows in the morning. By thus doing the whole of the oleaginous fluid of one half of the quantity of milk brought to Wellington is extracted, leaving behind what we in our simplicity call milk, although any other name would represent its intrinsic character as accurately. The objectionable practice of " setting " the milk in zine pans is also carried on in some dairies, and as the carbonate and oxide of the metal are almost certain to become incorporated with the milk, owing to their peculiar decomposing qualities, the fluid becomes not only unwholesome, but p sitively poisonous. Now, medical men in Wellington all agree that children on the breast in nearly every case survive, while children fed on cow's milk from the bottle, as a rule, succumb and die. What more positive argument can be produced to show that it is the cow's milk which, in the majority of instances, is the cause of the fatality ? In my own house I had two children of the same age —one brought up on the breast, the other on the bottle. Both were to all appearance sinking fast; but the one brought up on the breast eventually recovered, while the one fed on cow's milk died. Water, too, as I before mentioned, is mixed with milk in large quantities, and water at this time of the year being far from pure must, in a great measure, tend to assist the large mortality amongst infants. Some time ago Archdeacon Stock wrote a very able letter in your journal advocating the use of preserved milks in preference to the milks sold in Wellington, but I think the efficacy of that must greatly depend on where the milk is obtained from, that from Switzerland being without doubt the most pure, while that from the United Kingdom is possibly far inferior to that supplied in Wellington. It is the duty of the police, or sanitary inspectors, to analyse the milk supplied from time to time, as it may—nay will—have the effect of providing this city with a purer supply.—l am, &c, C. S. H. Wellington, March 2, 1880. AN AFFECTIONATE GOOSE. Recently we noticed the case of an old gander which conceived a great affection for an old gentleman, who, by the way, as regards ability to understand anything, seems to have merited the appellation of a - " goose," as applied to people who say or do silly things. Having seen a letter in a daily contemporary as to there being a fat gander in the neighborhood of Carey and Portugal streets, we visited that locality and saw the gander in question. Unfortunately, it is just now not'in the best con-

dition. Owing to the cold and wet it has had a bad moulting season this year, and to cap this, a short time since had a fall down the cellar. However, Mrs. Saunders assured us it was getting better, V- ough at one time she feared she would lose it. It has lived in the neighborhood eight years, and knows it well. It is on capital terms with the other animals about, and with its mistress's ne ghbors, but especially with a cobbler, whom it has taken to visit daily since the death of Mr. Saunders. It is fed on bread and biscuits, and partial to liver and heart. It knows well where the biscuits come from, and it has again and again visited the public-house hard by and had a small beaker of liquor. Once for several months t"getht-r it refused to notice a man who gave it some drink that was too strong for it. When Mr. Saunders was alive it would hasten, half running ami half-flying, to meet him. In fact, its intelligence is marvellous, and it gives you the idea, when you are talking with Mrs. Saunders about it, that it understands what you are saying. It speaks well for the constitution of "Jack," as the bird is named, that it should have lived eight years in a crowded neigborhood, and hard by Lincoln's Inn and the Royal College of Surgeons, without having once suffered in health or at the hands of the lawyers.