FARM NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1798, 7 May 1886, Page 7

FARM NOTES.

Agricultural Products. — The wool production of the Colouy ha* gone on steadily increasing. In 1885 the quantity exported was 86,507,4311b; in 1884 it was 81,139,0281b; in 1883 the export stood at 68,149,4301b ; in 1882 it was 65,322, 7071W ;'m 1831 the quantity shipped was 59,415,9101b; thus showing an inci-emst-d production in (ivo y«jaiv. of 27,000,0001b. The extent of the rabbit, pest, and tho efforts that arc being made to exterminate it, may be measured by the fact that in 18S5 there were exported 9,168,114 skins. In 1882, 1883, and 1884 the numbers sent away were slightly in excess of these figures for each y :ar. In 1870 them were only 31J ,t>32 skin- .shipped, but by J BBI the number hail risen to 5,514,ti55. The. raining industry shows a slight falliiig-oft" compaied with preceding years, the gold shipped in 1885 being 322,7320z ; in J 884 , 24(i,3920z ; in 1883, 323,8990z ; in 18S1, 230,890az. Turning to the figures dealing with the products of the agriculturist, we iind that there has be.'n a very seiious diminution iv the exporl. of wheat, theoaiuse of which it. only too well known to all who take an interest in such matters. In LBBo we exporter! 1,359,119 bushel-,, as against 2.70(i,775 in 188-1. On the other h«ud, mall, barley, aTid oats show a ».atisfn«tory advance. The export of oats was 2,817,000 bushels iv ISBS, compared with 2,474,631 bushels in ISSi, and 1,019,764 in 18S3. The export of buMer has risen fiom 15,7o\>cwt iv 1884 to 21,929 in 18S5 ; that of cheese from 10,342cwt in lb'B4. i o 15,452cwt in 1885 ; salt beer and pork fi-oiu 13,559uwt in 1881 to 20,] 2-1 cwt during last year. Pre.vrved meats were exported to tlv *in';iint;of 36.142cwt in ]SSS, compared with27,7llc\\t in 1884. Frozen meat now occupies third place in, the Hit of our exports a.s far as value is concerned, being put down as_ £1.373,857, repre5enting296,743cwt ; wool coining lir.st, and gold s^ond, frozen mutton, as wehausaid,thiid; k.uiri i;um fourth, this export being valued at £1,29!>,762 ; oats fifth, and wheat sixth, these last mentioned products during 18S5 being put down in the returns as worth respectively ,£2ft"O,JL'S9S and .6181,766. The timber trade ha* developed with yival rapidity during the l.'usl few years. In 1878 we exported 4,071,326 ft of saw v limber, but Miu-e that date the export ha-i rapidly increas, d, until it is now 28,439,013 ft, valued ab £157,000. The United Kingdom i-; still the great market for our exports, that countiy absorbing iv 1885 produce to the va.hu ■ of £4,90b',907. New South Wales, receiving goods to the value of ,£722,7791 Victoria comes third, taking £466,029 worth. South Australia paid us £60, (i23 for our produce: Queensland, L 59.270; and Tasmania, £37,135, in 1885 Tho United Statenwas a custuim r totheamounjof L 404.87 5; ami the Pacific Islandb, including Fiji and Norfolk Island, took £105,181 worth of our produce and merchandi ie. — Pre.-.s. Houses on a Jouhney.— "H is the pace that kills." A horse may trot and canter sixty miles in one day. or more, but he cannot go on repeating the ' distance at those paces day after day. On tho London stones it is' found that thirteen miles a day for five or six days i.s as much as the aver.igo omnibus horse can do and keep in condition. The jog trot — the huntsman's pace. — about live miles' -an hour, is that at which a hors" ;• ,• •'.<■> the greatest; distances for the greatest ii.. u1,.-, of consecutive days, with the least fatiijin- ai.ii loss of condition. The rider may be n-lii'u-.l i>;, the horse occasionally walking—but not at the horse's best walking 'pace. On a long (Austra lian) journey go slowly. Never remain more than two hours in the saddle without dismounting for a few minutes to ease your horse's batK and legs. It is easier to save condition tluvi In replace it. Two miles at a trot tires as much a. three at a walk; walking at top speed is as tiring as trotting. "An average colonial .hor.se will carry his rider 100 miles in tweive or fourteen hours." To do 520 miles Ourr recommends four clays' work at twenty miles a day, and one days' rest; four at fifteen miles, at two clays' rest two at twenty-five miles, and one days' rest ; two at thirty, miles, and two days' rest ; five at thirty miles, and four days' rest ; four at thirty miles, and seven days' rest : that would be twenty-one days' work and seventeen days' rest; and he states from experience of months of overland travel that horses that would lie clown every night would finish the 520 fresh and able to gallop. He carries on tho calculation to 1500 miles performed with fiftjfsix days' woik and forty-four days' rest, or at the rate of fifteen miles a day. When travelling in Syria, as so many English and American travellers do now, Mrs Burton strongly recommends that some one of the party sees himself that the horres are duly fed every clay, and examines the nnck of each horse on unsaddling. Native attendants are capable of stealing the fodder and working the animals day after day until their backs are positively festering. — Book of the Horse. EvEiry Element Must be Supplied.— No matter how well the soil may be supplied with plant food, if it be destitute of a single elemout., (he plant will perish or become dwarfed. This fact is often overlooked by these who suppose that when they apply fertilisers or manure they have complied with all the condi-

tions required. The application of a fertiliser rich in nitrogen and potash, but deficient in phosphoric acid, will be of little benefit to a crop requiring that substance, and hence farmers are often disappointed in their expectations, through a lack of knowledge of the requirements necessary for fulfilling all the conditions essi.ntial to the maturity of the crop. For this reason manure ofton gives but little result when composed of substances deficient in necessary element h. These conditions are not generally observed, but experience will, in the end, correct, many mistakes. There is yet room in the field of agricultural knowledge and observation for much to be studied, and the results of research will be that as these matters are carefully considered, each decade will winess fewer difficulties and tend to success. A Cheap Silo. — A correspondent in tho Farmer's Gazette gives his experiences of sweet ensilage. He writes :— In last September I hail a field of second crop clover, which I intended to make into hay, but the weather coining wet, I saw there was no way to do it, aud as nece-s&ifcy is the mother of invention, and having no building to put the clover in, I said I would venture to try to convert the clover into ensilage in a ctaok. So accordingly, I had the clover carted in, which occupied two days, and had it wt'll tramped into a stack. On this I laid weights, consisting of stones, old metals, &c. On the following clay I had the stack finished with coarse hay, aud, after some days, thatched with straw. 'Lhe stack heated and smoked for several weeks, and my neighbours and men often told me that the " silo " was a failure. I consoled myself by saying that things could not be worse than if I had attempted to make hay at the time the crop was cut down. About a fortnight since I put it to the test, and although the clover looked black and moist, it had a most .fragrant smell, and the oattle eat it with avidity. I am using it with a lot of outlyers, and they consume it with a relish, much to the astonishment of my sceptical friends. The hay I used for covering the stack was also greedily consumed. The only part which showed any signs of greyuess or damage was an external ring about 18 inches in diameter, but even this the cattle did not refuse. If I had about a foot of this ring cut away with a hay-knife just as the stack was made, the injury would be very little indeed. The stack sank considerably, both clover and overlying hay, but the hay, contrary to our expectations, was not deteriorated. Here then, was an instance of a silo which cost nothing to make, and yet saved a valuable lot of fodder. Milking. — A writer in a contemporary says : — Perhaps the greatest difficulty experienced in introducing the dairy into some districts is in procuring dairy workers who are good milker?, and all the more &o as they are scarce enough where cows have been always kept. No matter how well a cow is fed and treated, and how good its constitutional qualities are, it will not yield well if not well milked. A cow should be milked quickly and cleanly, not by fils and starts, but evenly, and treated geutly meanwhile. It is a good point? if the milk is frothed up in the pail. As a rule, women are better milkers than men; they are more gentle than men, and their hands are smaller and hofter for the teats. If a milker works slowly, stops now and again, then goes on with a spurt, and speaks roughly to the cow or strikes her, the result will be that the cow will yield !e.s« and less milk and soon dry up altogether. It is a great pity we are not likely ever to have a successful milking machine, as it would help us a great deal if we had. It would be a good feature of the milking trials to give prizes to the attendants who can milk best. We have havo given a good deal of time and attention to th<; improvement of cattle, it would do no harm to try the improvement ancl development of the servants who look after them for a change, though, no doubt, the same reasoning would apply to bhe masters. Bkeeding Makes. —An article in the Kansas City Live Stock Indicator has recently ~ been devoted to recording observations on the length of time marfs will continue to breed. That journal says : — " We have taken 1000 brood mares of all ages aud determined how many of them were producing at different ages of 20 years and upwards. At 20 years old, 216 were still pi'odudiug; at 21 years, 175; at 22 years, 141 ; at 23 years, 83 ; at 24 years,. 49 ; at 25 years, 22 ; at 26 years, 8 ; at 27 years, 2 ; at 28 years, 2 ; at 2f) years, 1 ; at 30 years old, all had censed to produce. We have gleaned these facts from English experiences by carefully going through the seventh and part of the eighth volume of the English Stud Book, and taking all brood mares as .they there appear in their alphabetical order. This embraces a period say from 1830 to 1850, when the records of the English racehorse had assumed a methodical and practically reliable form. In the first volume of that work a great many marvellously old mares are to be found, which seems to h'avi' been a necessity in order to accoinmodati 1 all (he foals that olaimed to have I'oino, from tlutm. But the volumes we have used for making up this table have an abundance of internal evidence that they are compiled with great, caro aud good judgment. The only feature that staggers our judgment is the fact that two mares appear to have been producing at the ag? of 28 and one at the age of 29. Still the record seems to bo "'/' out a flaw, and we must accept it. In onu >•••■. ic't this table fails to give important fails '.vim regard to the treatment of mares approaching 20 years. As ] we understand il, after a mare has reached well ' into tho "teens" and has still failed to produce winners, she is sold for a hack or some purpose of drudgery, or bred to a farmhorse that she may produce something that may bo useful. At this point, then, we lose all trace of her, and the field is practically restricted to such as have been successful and profitable producers. It is not literally true, therefore, that of the 1000 mares embraced in the table only 216 were living and capable of breeding at the age of 20, but from that period forward the table shows the rate of decadence until the power to reproduce is finally extinguished under the weight of years." Pedigree; Ceheals ,— The advantage of using none but the best seeds (by which we mean not only sound, healthy seed, but also that of approved strains) is becoming every year more apparent. We are not surprised, therefore, to hear of the striking results that have followed the use of Major Hallett's "pedigree" wheat, barley, and oats, which grown originally from the best single grain in a selected stock, have been kept absolutely pure for 23 years. — Home paper. Best Cross for Beef.— When two bn,v ' . are crossed, tho tendency of both breeds having been for generations to produce beef and lay on fat, this inclination is intensified, and usually that to early fattening besides. On this account, feeders of steers and heifers for the prize ring as fat cattlo frequently raise crossbreds, and fqr th^s purpose we can conceive of no bottov cross than that of an Angus bull upon a large shorthorn cow. — American Agriculturist.

(Continwd on, page J3.)