THE RURAL WORLD.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20432, 12 June 1928, Page 4

THE RURAL WORLD.

FARM AND STATION NEWS.

By Rttstictts.

Fruit Export Figures. The total quantity of fruit exported from the Dominion this season will total 1,017,863 packages—963,6l6 cases of apples and 54,247 crates. of pears. The whole of the fruit was exported to the United Kingdom, with the exception of 60,372 cases of apples and 300 crates of pears for Montevideo, 23,753 cases of apples for Rio de Janeiro, and 10,921 cases of apples for Montreal. Details o! the season’s shipments are as follow:

The Frozen Meat Market. Ever since the week ended May 5 prices for frozen meat at Smithfield have shown chilled beef, both fores and hinds showing an upward tendency. Last week any change recorded for frozen meats was in sellers’ favour except for Argentine a drop of l-8d per lb. The prices compiled by the Quotations Committee of the Imported Meat Trade Association, Incorporated (such quotations being the average for the week show that North Island mutton (64-721 b) advanced l-Bd. All weights of Canterbury lamb advanced l-8d to 3-Bd, the heavy-weights showing the greatest advance. There was a general rise of 1-Sd for all North Island lamb; first quality being quoted at lOd for lightweight and 9 5-8 d for heavy-weight, and second quality at 9Jd. New Zealand frozen beef is steady at 4d for ox fores and 5 7-8 d for ox hinds. Hemp Grading. Large decreases are shown in the quantities of hemp and tow graded at Dominion ports during May, compared with the corresponding month of last year. The gradings were as follow: —

The Wool Positoin. There is nothing new that can be said about the wool market. The question of country selling of wool, to which reference was made in a recent commercial cable message, is entirely an Australian affair. New Zealand woolgrowers long since abandoned making sales to itinerant buyers, and prefer marketing their clips at the local auction sales, which have steadily growh in importance, or con-, signing to London. Even the latter practice is going out of fashion. Shearing will commence in Queensland this month and will gradually extend to other States in Australia, so that another wool season will begin very soon. For the reasons that they will not exclude water, tear easily, do not retain their shape, are more difficult to handle and are apt to split at the seams when the wool is being pressed, all-wool bales are not regarded favourably by woolmen in Australia. These defects were revealed in a test. A purchaser of wool in woollen packs reported that the tare was lighter and there was no risk of strings of jute getting into the wool, but that the pack was liable to suffer more in transport because it was easily torn and difficult to repair. Dairy Produce Market. There is just now comparatively little butter of New Zealand origin on the London market, for it is the turn of the Northern Hemisphere to feed the market. London firms, in advising their agents here, stated that buyers were acting very cautiously, anticipating a mild spring with moist weather, which would be likely to favour a large European make. There is not much significance in the fact that New Zealand butter has been quoted Is above Danish, except to emphasise the increased output from Denmark. Danish and colonial butters are two entirely separate markets, and the price of Danish is not influenced at all by the quantity of New Zealand and Australian butter that comes on the market. So long as Denmark has only 3C,ooocwt to 38,000 cwt of butter to export to Britain each week, it does not matter what the retail price this quantity clears, but when supplies from Denmark increase, as is now' the case, then prices recede. The Danes have a way of clearing each week’s marketings raising or lowering prices as circumstances require. With a big output in Europe, prices must drop, but it is never safe to predict the future of the butter market for any long period ahead, because it is impossible to forecast the climatic conditions. Last season it was expected that Australia, owing to drought, would have very little butter to export, but the season had not advanced very far when copious rains ended the drought and there followed a big increase in the output of butter. Australia is promised another good season, according to all accounts. The Dairying Year. "As the early spring months were favoured with good dairying w'eather, the production returns were exceptionally high up to the end of 1927, and hopes were held that a definite record would be established for the season. Unfortunately, from November onwards a protracted drought prevailed in the major dairying districts of the North Island, and as a consequence the autumn has failed to maintain the earlier promise. The final outcome of the season will probably be that the total butter-fat production will be but little higher than that of last year. This result, having regard to the conditions, is in itself very satisfactory. Had it not been for the application of fertilisers and the other causes mentioned, the decline, due to the drought, would have been far more marked than has been the case, and the position, therefore, is that the dairy industry is in reality in better shape for the future than at any previous time in its history. In the above terms, the executive of the National Dairy Association of New Zealand, Ltd., prefaces its thirty-fourth report, which will be presented at the annual meeting at Palmerston North on June 19. Akaroa Cocksfoot. “ That the importation of cocksfoot seed from Denmark is unnecessary and undesirable. and also a possible means of introducting foot-and-mouth disease,” was a remit passed by the North Canterbury district conference of the Farmers’ Union last week. In speaking to the remit, Mr D. Bates said that the locally-grown seed was far better than that imported. There was nothing like Peninsula cocksfoot for producing foliage. Mr J. D. Hall: Locally-grown is not appreciated in the North Island, but our seed is substantially better than any other. In Australia, Akaroa cocksfoot is always quoted a penny higher.

Items of interest to those engaged In agricultural and pastoral with a view to their publication in these columns, will be welcomed She/ should be addressed to “Rufiti cus,” Otago Daily Times, Dunedin*

Vitality of Buried Seeds. Mr F. L. Engledew writes interestingly in “ Agricultural Research in 1926,” upon the above subject. He says that from time to time the story of the growing of prehistoric wheat grains from Egyptian tombs is repeated, and not always without receiving credence. While we need not pause to consider the longevity of seeds in terms of centuries, to have some estimate of it in years is at once interesting and important. The seed of most of our crop plants retains viability but a few years. Four years’ storage reduces the germination capacity of many common crops to 50 per cent, or less. ._. . A recent paper, by a well-known scientist, furnishes evidence of much interest. In the year 1902, seeds of 107 species of plants were buried in the soil at three depths. Sin, 22in and 42in. Samples were dug up after intervals of one, three, six, 10, 16, and 21 years. In general, deterioration of the seeds was found to be more marked at a depth of Sin than at 22in or 42in. Between these last two depths, differences were small. For no fewer than 51, out of the 107 species of plants tested, some weeds were found to be alive at the end of 21 years. Of these 51 species, there were 12 of which living seed was found at all three depths. Among these 12 was a solitary crop plant—tobacco — the rest being species of weeds. Australian Butter Market. Special reference is made in the report of the National Dairy Association of New Zealand to the severe tariff hurdle raised against New Zealand butter by the Commonwealth Government. The review states; —“ Considerable interest has been manifested during the year in the concern shown by Australia at the importation of New Zealand butter into that country. Always of a seasonal nature, this hrs been intensified because of the operatic*, of what is known as the ‘ Paterson ’ scheme in the Commonwealth. Under this the opportunity offered for the importation of butter from New Zealand is on a favourable basis. The Australian dairymen objected to this as trenching upon their own lucrative home, market. So much concern developed over the position that the Australian Minister of Customs, the late Mr H. E. Pratten, was despatched by his Government to New Zealand to consult with Mr Downie Stewart, Minister of Customs in this country, concerning the imposition of a fid per lb duty against New Zealand butter. It was desired this should be made operative in a less period than the six months required by the agreement between the two countries. We must congratulate' Mr Downie Stewart,” states the review, “ upon his firmness in resisting this suggestion, and maintaining the need for the full term required under the agreement. While the Australian dairymen must have full liberty of action to determine their own course, we cannot but think it regrettable that prohibitive barriers should be erected restricting trade between parts of the Empire.” ALLEGED BREACH OF FAITH. CROWN TENANTS. GOVERNMENT CRITICISED. Criticism of the Government was made when the following motion was carried by the North Canterbury district conference of the Farmers’ Union: —“ That the Dominion Executive of the Farmers’ Union be requested to investigate the position of Crown tenants of small grazing runs under the Land Act, 1892, who have been deprived of the benefits conferred on them by the Act, and compelled to pay much higher rents on the renewal of their leases than they were originally liable to do.” Mr P. Fisher (Oxford) said that under the Land Act, 1892, tenants of small grazing runs had a perpetual right of renewal at a rent based on 2J per cent, of the unimproved value. After that Act had been in operation for 20 years the Lands Department refused to recognise that right, and the matter was contested in the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeal in New Zealand, and before the Privy Council in England, and in each case the claim of the tenant to a renewal on 2i per cent, basis was upheld. “The Government, in order to overcome these decisions and defeat the claims of the tenants of the small runs,” continued Mr Fisher, “ amended the Land Act in the dying hours of the session of 1918 so as to deprive these tenants of their right of renewal on a 21 per cent, basis, and raised it to 4 per cent. This amending Act of 1918 is retrospective in its operation, and unjust in its effect, besides being a breach of faith with the tenants.” , , Mr J. E. Horrell opposed the remit on the ground that in the original Act it was intended that the price should he reviewed after the first 20 years. “ I can’t understand Mr Horrell’s attitude,” said Mr J. D. Hall. “Men took up Crown land years ago when no one else wanted it, and so they received cheap rates. The Privy Council has investigated the whole matter and has ruled against the Crown. This judgment must be accepted.” BOOSTING PRODUCTION. WORK OF TESTING ASSOCIATIONS. LEGISLATION AGAINST SCRUB BULL. Herd testing has been responsible for an amazing increase in the average production of New Zealand dairy herds over the past decade. Much more can be accomplished in the future. Herd testing associations have done great work, and the time has arrived for a national campaign against the scrub bull. Legislation could well be introduced as in Ireland and other progressive agricultural countries, making necessary registration of every bull used, for breeding purposes. Only when this is done will adequate control be exercised. With New Zealand's unequalled combination, climate, and fertile pastures, amazing possibilities await the advocates of increased production. Nowhere is this more evident than in the dairying industry. The operations of the New Zealand Herd-testing Association over the past four years in the Waikato provide striking testimony as. to what can be accomplished through this agency. In 1923-25, in the Waikato, the percentage of cows giving less than 2001 b of butter-fat per annum was 48.23. This had been reduced in 1926-27 to 25.18. The number giving to from 2001 b to 3001 b had been increased from 40.16 per cent, to 46.50 per cent., and, best of all, the number of cows giving 3001 b and over had been increased from 3599, representing 11.61 per cent., to 17,138, or 28.32 per cent, of the total number of cows tested. What was being done in the Waikato might be done with every herd in the Dominion, and the possibilities of further improvement are so great that it is difii-, cult to understand why herd-testing had been neglected for so long. The herds which to-day were averaging 3001 b would in a few years be giving 4001 b, and even then the limit would not have been reached. If the 1,350,000 cows in the Dominion, which averaged about 2001 b of butter-fat per annum, weer brought up to the average of the cows tested in the Waikato, the increased return to New Zealand at Is 41d a lb of butter-fat would amount to £4,432,632. That figure represented the increase for one year only. The progressive results achieved by systematic herdtesting would give an increased profit year by year. Each year’s delay in bringing up the average yield a cow to the Waikato basis of 1926-27 was costing the country over £4,000,000 per annum. So much for testing. Without correct breeding, it can accomplish little. The two must go hand in hand.

Hard though it may seem, even to-day there is too big a percentage of scrub bulls about. Hard times mostly, but otten a spirit of indifference, is responsible for a very low quality standard of sire being used on many New Zealand farms. Inis must stop, and until it does it will be practically impossible to lift the average production of our herds to a worth-while Shorthorn and Aberdeen-Angus cattle breeders in Scotland recently appealed to the Scottish Chamber of Agriculture to use its influence in an offensive against the “scrub” bull. When the request came before the chamber, it was stated that the legislation passed by the i arliament of Northern Ireland was proving successful. The legislation, which is similar in many essential provisions to that which the Visctonan Chamber of Agriculture has suggested should be passed in Victoria, provides for the compulsoi y licensing of bulls. Its mam features are as follow:- — , No bulls can be kept for breeding unless they are licensed. A penalty is provided for contravention. Permits are granted to owners to keep bulls to be fed for beef only. -iA fee of 5s is charged for the license of each animal, the license remaining m force during the lifetime of animals unless revoked or suspended. Bulls licensed are tattooed on the ear with a letter and a number, and those rejected with the letter “R” only. An appeal against the refusal oi a license is decided by an appeal judge, who is a breeder of cattle, and independent of the Ministry of Agriculture. A fee of £2 2s falls to be paid on lodging an appeal. Bulls are inspected at the more important spring bull sales and at local centres, fixed so that no breeder will require to bring his animal more than three miles, twice each year—in February and September—by inspectors appointed by the Minister of Agriculture. The standard for licensing was gradually raised, only really low grade bulls being rejected to begin with. The percentage of rejections thus rose from 5.7 per cent, in September, 1923, to 36.0 per cent, in February, 1926. The Act has not reduced the number of bulls, as 6209 bulls were licensed in 1923, and 6639 in March, 1920. In 1926 there were 2211 purebred bulls, and this number is gradually increasing, thus increasing the demand for pedigree bulls. The Act has worked smoothly, only 52 appeals against refusal of license having been lodged, and 17 of these were successful. Three of the regular livestock officials of the Ministry of Agriculture are employed as inspectors for about a month in the year. The fees received amount to about £IOOO, and cover approximately the expenditure of the Minister under the Act. Already there are strong advocates for the consideration of similar legislation for New Zealand. It would certainly be in the best interests of breeders generally, and .by it farmers would have all to gain and nothing to lose. Surely anything that has proved satisfactory and helped to boost production elsewhere is worthy of consideration here. LAND FERTILISATION. AN HISTORICAL SURVEY. GROWTH OF ITS PRACTICE. FUNCTIONS OF YATHOUS MANURES. The manuring of land (writes Sir John Russell, director of Rothamstcd, in The Times, supplement) is probably as old as civilisation itself: everywhere, except for a few rich soils, manure of some sort has to be added to keep up fertility. Farmyard manure is one of the oldest and still one of the best, but it is rarely obtainable in sufficient quantities, and in consequence farmers and their advisers have always been driven to search for substitutes. The science of manuring arose when chemists and plant physiologists joined in the search and began to use those precise methods which have steadily given more and more accurate information at greater and greater cost of time and money. It was Lawes at Rothamstcd who, about 1839. first applied on the farm the scientific knowledge gained by do Saussur, of Geneva, and others, and critically assembled by Liebig in 1340. Lawes founded the artificial fertiliser industry, which has since grown to enormous dimensions, and, in conjunction with Gilbert, began in 1843 the systematic and extensive field experiments now known all over the world as the Rothamstcd experiments, which have added greatly to the scientific knowledge of the nutrition of plants. . Three groups of fertilisers are found to be necessary, supplying respectively nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. The nitrogenous fertilisers were for many years derived from coal and from Chilean nitrate of'soda; the phosphatic fertilisers from rock phosphate and basic slag; and the potassic fertilisers from Stassfurt, Supplies are enormous, but towards the end of the nineteenth century the fear arose that they might not suffice to feed a world that had grown amazingly in population within a few decades. Sir William Crookes in 1898 stated the problem and showed the way out; it was to obtain nitrogenous fertilisers from the air by the method discovered many years before by Cavendish. The suggestion was taken up—processes were devised whereby the inexhaustible supplies of atmospheric nitrogen were for the first time in the world’s history utilised for making nitrogenous manures; these have since been developed and the latest one, completely different in every respect from the first, is adopted at the Imperial Chemical Industries Works at Billingham. The result is to banish all fear of a fertiliser famine, and to relieve experts of any necessity for trying to curtail the use of fertilisers. The three best known nitrogenous fertilisers arc nitrate of soda, nitrate of lime, and sulphate of ammonia; a fourth, cyanamide, has in recent years come on the market and is being seriously studied by experts. Three others—are now being or are about to be made muriate of ammonia, urea, and ammonium phosphate, alone or in admixture. These fertilisers increase the leaf area of the plant, and therefore the total weight. They are very effective in causing increases in yield, being, indeed, perhaps the most certain of all fertilisers in their action. One hundredweight of sulphate of ammonia applied to an acre of land may reasonably be expected to add 2501 b to 3001 b to the yield of wheat, barley, or oats, 20cwt to the yield of potatoes, of which nearly 5001 b would be dry matter, and corresponding increases in yield of grass. These gains, however, presuppose adequate supplies of phosphate and potassium; for it is one of the first principles in the use of fertilisers that plants must have a complete food. It is not necessary that those two nutrients should bo given to each crop; unlike the nitrogen fertilisers, which are liable to be washed away, these neither waste nor wash out from ordinary soils, and in practice, therefore, they are added only to those crops that respond most to them—phosphates to the root crops, potassic fertilisers to mangolds or potatoes. Succeeding crops take whatever is left. The oldest and commonest phosphatic manure in use is superphosphate. Basic slag competes with it in popularity, and finely-ground mineral phosphates are now being extensively offered. Superphosphates has several important effects on the plant. It encourages the development of roots, the tillering of cereals, and ripening. Basic slag is of special value on poor grass land, especially where the soil is clay. Over great areas of England it has brought about wonderful improvements; it apepars to he less effective, however, on better class land. One great advantage of superphosphate on arable land is that it helps the plant so much in difficult seasons; at Rothamstcd it has nearly doubled the swede crop in a hail year, and so given supplies of animal food at a time when they were particularly desirable. Another effect which it has in common with basic slag is to increase the feeding value of the crop. There are many unsolved problems connected witli phosphatic fertilisers. For example, in some circumstances silicates help the plant to take up phosphates, but it is not known how; nor can this effect yet be utilised, though experiments are being made. Further,' the more phosphate a plant takes up the bettor in general is its quality, yet the phosphorous intake is not related in any simple way to the supply of phosphatic fertiliser. Potassic fertlisers arc associated with dairying, with sheep, potatoes, and fruit. They increase the efficiency of the leaf as an assimilator of carbon dioxide, and therefore help in sugar and starch production, and they also help to improve the quality of fruit. They help to make up for lack of sunshine, having special value in seasons like 1926 and 1927. char-

acterised by deficiency of sunlight. They give vigour to the plant, enabling it to overcome unfavourable conditions to some extent, whether these arise from bad seasons, disease, or adverse soil conditions. In the nineteenth century the problem of the scientific adviser was to show farmers that artificial fertilisers were effective agents for increasing crop growth. The problems of to-day are with the effects of fertilisers in mitigating the harmful effects of inclement seasons, in modifying the properties or qualities of the crop, in influencing its reaction to disease pests, and, more generally, in , ascertaining how to use fertilisers so as to raise bigger, better, healthier crops at less expense than at present.

Apples. Cases. Pears. Crates. Northumberland .. 13,757 Tainui .. 8,096 — Hertford .. 28,869 1,769 Huntingdon .. 29,145 1,332 Arawa ' 9,074 — Matatua .. 28,903 — Mataroa .. .. 35,658 10,302 Mali ana .. 29,605 5,306 Cornwall .. 50,019 Port Hunter .. .. 23,776 222 Cambridge .. 19,280 Rotorua .. 24,681 15,541 Corinthio ,. .. 22,803 9.102 Argyllshire .. 58,299 — Devon 337 Pakeha .. 28,261 Port Napier .. 10,921 — Herminius .. .. 14,696 — Westmoreland .. .. 57,667 6,484 Port Victor .. 44,418 — Port Adelaide .. .. 25,843 561 Ionic ,. 39,374 1,089 Somerset .. 70,532 1,791 Tongariro ... .. 67,733 — Mamari .. 15,853 — Mahia ... 26,529 300 Zealandic 25.030 111 Maimoa 11,000 Turakina .. .. 27,454 — Tasmania ,. 17,600 — Tamaroa .. 10,000 — Port Dunedin .. .. 10,800 — Total .. .. 963,616 54,247

May, 1928. May 1927. Inc. Dec. Bales.Bales. Bales. Bales. Hemp ., 4412 8264 — 3852 Tow 1388 2386 — 998 Stripper tow 24 46 — 22 Stripper slips 230 179 52 —