AGRICULTURAL AND PASTORAL NEWS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2059, 10 August 1893, Page 7

AGRICULTURAL AND PASTORAL NEWS.

Rabbits appear to be increasing to an alarming extent at the east side of the Hakateramea Valley, in South Canterbury. Several holders of small grazing runs on Station Peaks have petitioned the Canterbury Land Board for a reduction of their rent on account of the increase of the pest ; but the board decided they had no power to do .so. One holder of 3000 acres stated that he had paid for over 11,000 skins in 12 months ended July last ; another occupier of 3300 acres took 4800 rabbits off his land since Ist April ; and a third stated that during last year he had paid a sum equal to the rental (£6O) of his 1000 acres in trying to keep down the pest. . Mr B. Gawn, of North Taieri, has sold his Clydesdale Earl of Glasgow to Messrs Pelichet and Johnston, Hawke's Bay. At last week's meeting of the Waitahuna Farmers' Club a letter was read from Mr D.

Dun, secretary of the Gore Farmers' Club, stating that at a meeting of their club on July 15 it was resolved — " That action should be takes to secure the abolition of the 2£ per cent, deduction for cash on wheat transactions ; that the bags be paid for as in the case of oats," and requesting the co-operation of the Waitahuna Club in the matter, and proposing to hold a meeting of delegates in Dunedin under the auspices of the Farmers' Union of all those societies which are prepared to support the above resolution. On the motion of Mr M'Ara, seconded by Mr Adam M'Corkindale, the secretary was directed to acknowledge receipt of the above letter, and to state in reply :— " That this club will heartily co-operate with them in endeavouring to abolish the custom of charging 2± per cent, discount on wheat transactions, and that bags should be paid for also." Thursday's Christchurch Press sajs:— "The amount of stock yarded for yesterday's stock sales was not large, and business thoughout the day was auything but brisk. Several pens of exceptionally fiae cattle were included in the entry of fat cattle, which was an unusually j large one. Buyers showed considerable spirit, prices remaining firm at late rates. Very few baconers were penned, other sorts of pigs being numerous. For the former prices were unusually high, but porkers and stores met with little demand. Considerable improvement was, noticeable in sale of store cattle, young stock especially coming in for attention. Several good s'zed lines of store I sheep helped to comfortably fill the pens set apart for them. Buyers confined most of their attention to breeding ewes and hoggets, but little life was shown for any class of sheep. A small supply of fat sheep was penned, merinos being in unusually heavy supply. Taken all round the quality of the crossbreds was fairly good, but, with the exception of a few picked fines, nothing came in for much attention. For" best quality values showed little alteration, but second-rate sorts were again easier. It is evident that prices are suffering from the easier tone prevailing in the Home market, and until a change takes place there no material advance can be looked for here." -. Mr Darbyshire, of Brisbane, has kindly shown us (Queenslander) a letter from hiß brother, who is a large stockowner in the Argentine Republic, giving results of a shipment of 400 live sheep to Liverpool. There were only two deaths on the voyage. The sheep wera sold in Liverpool for 40s 7d, giving 711b dresßed mutton, which sold at 5Jd per lb ; skins, 4s 9d. The freight was 11s, the net result to theEstanciero being 255. It is evident the sheep were either pure coarse-woolled sheep or very good cross- ! breds ; but the above facts suggest whether it would not be possible to ship live sheep from

Queensland to England. Even if they did not arrive in a condition to be slaughtered at once, the price of store sheep in England is very largely in advance of the price of fat sheep here. The late Mr Mort was the first to demonstrate the fact that meat could be preserved fresh for an indefinite period by refrigeration ; but it was South America that first placed a cargo of frozen meat on a European market, by taking advantage of Mr Mort't discovery. It is possible that the Bame country has now shown us the way to dispose of our surplus sheep in a way that Trill give better returns even than freezing. During the last few years a very striking feature of the trade for beef and mutton, says the Live Stock Journal, has been the great dif- I ference in the prices realised for high and low qualities. Even in the worst of times quotations for the very best have been maintained, while moderate and inferior descriptions have j made rates which could not possibly leave any ! margin of profit to the producer. This has been the result of foreign competition, and the ' same characteristic haß been visible in the markets for live cattle and sheep of the commercial sorts, the obvious lesson being that under existing circumstances only the best will pay. ' What is the secret (asks the Leeds Mercury. | of a late date) of the Danish and Swedish buttermakers' success, referred to in Wednesday's Mercury ? The answer is, as clearly to ! be gathered from the article, co-operation. | And it is co-operation all along the line— not ! only in the making of the butter, but also in its marketing. Professor Long and other dairy authorities in this country are constantly running down dairy factories, on the ground that i the best butter and the best cheese are made in private dairies. That is perfectly true ; but it is also true that the worst products come from the private dairies. If a man can get a good retail sale for his butter, he can do a great deal better by making it at home than by sending his milk to a dairy factory ; but for one who can get rid of his butter by retail at a high price, there are 10 who haye to sell to local dealers or shopkeepers at miserable prices during the season of plenty. But the fault of the factory system in this country is that it is mainly a proprietary one, and that it means therefore only a new form of the middleman element in business. Miserable prices are given by most of the factories for milk, and therefore it is no wonder that they are not commonly beneficial to farmers. But if they were purely co-operative the price would not matter, as the farmers would divide the profits in proportion to the quantity of milk contributed by each. In other words, they wonld co-operate in making butter in the moßt economical and efficient manner, and would receive the whole

of the results after paying working expenses. But this is not all. The owner of a private dairy usually sells his butter to a local dealer because it would not pay him to Bend little lots to a good market ; and if it would pay him, dealers in the great towns do not want a number of little lotß all of different quality. The Co-operative Dairy Company meets both difficulties. It can afford to send large lots of butter to distant markets, and it is able to I guarantee as near an approach to uniformity of quality as the exporters of Danish butter can. It can even establish shops of its own in seaside places or great towns, and sell all its produce by retail. In Ireland the co-operative butter factories are increasing, are successful, and are already the means of raising the standard of Irish batter. In view of the all-round satisfaction which has attended the Grasmere Cheese and Butter Factory Company's experiment of paying for I milk according to quality, it is somewhat sur-' prising (says the Melbourne Weikly Times) j that up to the present time none of the other factories have adopted the system. The only possible drawback anticipated by the management of the Grasmere factory when making the innovation was the opposition which might be offered to it by suppliers of milk, more especially tho°e whose pastures and herds were of an inferior kind, but who, whilst payments were made at per gallon, received pecuniary returns as good as, and in some instances better than, others who supplied rich, profitable milk. The suppliers, however, appear to recognise the justice of the system, which pays according to the actual value of the product, and judging from the improvement in the quality of the milk as shown by the test made with a Weigel milk tester during June, aB compared with those of the preceding month, a praiseworthy effort is being made towards improving the quality of the milk supplied. The returns of the factory for June show the quantity of milk delivered during the month to have been 32,413ga1, which, according to the test showing, gave a return of 14,48Wb of butter. The price paid was 9d per lb for butter, which is equal to 4d per gallon for milk. It seems unaccountable (remarks the Queenslander) that what are known as "group prizes" are not more generally taken up by our agnI cultural societies, and-that even when they do «et a place in a prize sohedule they are so sparingly taken advantage of by breeders. For gome years group prizes have been offered by the National Association at its Bowen Park shows in the cattle section, but in each case only one or two breeders have competed. Last year the same society offered, for the first time, prizes for a group of sheep— that is, a ram or ewe with a certain number of their progeny— and the

sheepbreedors showed their appreciation of the new departure by large entries, and these group prizes were the most interesting in the show. The value of a bull or of a ram is precisely what his value is at the stud ; and there is no more practical way of showing the value of a sire than by exhibiting some of his stock alongside of him. The prize has this further benefit ; that the progeny can be closely compared with the Bire, and if the stock resemble him it may pretty well be taken for granted that the progeny will also be impressive as sires or dams. In the Journal of the Royal Agricultural Society of England Mr R. Henry Rew contributes a paper, in which he states that in 1892 upwards of 51,000 tons of mutton from Australia and New Zealand were sold in the London wholesale^market at from 40 to 50 per cent, below the price of Home-grown meat, and were then retailed over the counter at the same price as British meat, and under the same name. Figures are quoted to show that of last year's supply of meat at the central meat market nearly one-half was foreign. M. Deherain, one of the most distinguished of the French chemists who have devoted their researches^ in great measure to agricultural science, .has communicated to the Academy of Science' the results of trials which he has made on two occasions to ascertain the connection between the working of the soil and itß nitri* fioation. He found that the pulverisation of the BoiV greatly accelerated the process in question, thus confirming some previous results obtained by Sohlcesing. But he also found that the quantity of nitric acid in the soil in November was Very much greater than in March, owing to the loss which occurs in drainage water during winter. As it is in the spring and early summer that most of the crops utilise the available nitrogen of the soil, M. Deherain proceeds to point out the necessity of thorough stirrings of the fields during these periods The common plan of laying land up for- the winter with the plough, he remarks, is excellent, as it is not thus triturated, but is laid up in solid furrows, in which form it shoots off much. of the rain that falls upon it, and the loss of nitrates in drainage water is consequently minimised. But' in spring the soil cannot be too thoroughly, stirred, provided that it be dry enough, before corn and seed are sown, or afterwards, so far as is feasible, after the corn and roots plants ate up. By improving the methods of pulverising the soil in spring and summer, M. Deherain believes that we might dispeni e with the use of nitrate of soda ; but this is a doubtful statement. The Queenslander says that mule breeding has obtained a footing in Queensland, and that within the' past few weeks two shipments of mules leit that colony under consignment to the New South Wales Sugar Company. One of

the shipments was from a northern port, the other from Brisbane. The latter was an exceptionally fine lot from Buaraba, being sired by a very large and handsome Spanish ass imported some years ago by the Darling Downs and Western Land Company. The following extract from a letter from a landowner , at Kent, written to a well-known resident in Sydney, has (writes the Sydney Morning Herald) a practical bearing on some of our exporting industries :—" I heard a queer thing in farming to-day. There is a man at Medhurst, Sussex, who has a herd of 80 cows. He sends every drop of milk to London, and buys Australian bntter for his own family use ; as he says it is ratter than the English butter he can buy, anAj, cheaper than making it at home." A hreeder in Iceland, who has tried caustic potash as-a preventive to tho growth of horns in. calves, gives 'hHs experience iv the North British Agriculturist. For tho last two years he has operated pn all calves intended to become bullocks wfien they were four to oigbt days old. The operation is so simple that a boy can do it in flvfctininutes. The hair is clipped off from where tjie horn is forming, and the bare spot is wetted with the caustic potash, and rubbed gently until the skin becomes reddish. This effectually prevents the growth of horn, and the calf, it is said, shows no sign of suffering. This breeder, who does nob give his name, has triedthe plari (now common in America) on shorthorns, Ayrshires, and West Highlanders, and apparently be has not had a case ol failure. Formerly he used to saw off the horns of his cattle; but he that it is a painful operation. . ... 3 • In the course of the inquiry being made in England with reference to marking foreign meat it transpired that in Denmark all the meat supplied to lat;ge towns is inspected by a veterinary surgeon, both before and after slaughter, and marked as first or second class, as the case may be. The marking is done by an ordinary metal stamp with a wooden handle ; the colour used is specially prepared for the purpose, .'dries quickly, adheres well, and is only efface^ with great difficulty. The carcase is stamped afber it has bscome stiff. These hints may be of service to us in the eveat of our shipping 'frozen meat to Egypt and France, the authorities there stipulating that it shall have been passed by competent authorities at this end: ,< Cross-breeding, as it is termed, has been found to produce' a class of cattle which will resist epizootic forms of disease to which pure breeds readily fall victims. An analogous process in plants, known as hybridising, or cress fertilisation, producas in many instances disease-resisting plants, and it ib the general

opinion of a large class of agriculturists that to this process wo mutife look to produce a'rustresisting wheat. A' disease known as "firigerand'toe" has of late years committed great havoc in the turnip fields of the old country ; but experiments in hybridising have resulted in the raising of a new .variety of turnip which effectually resists this' withering disease,- and the new variety has been given the significant name of the •• Achilles" turnip. Mr. James Pink is reputed to be a past master in the art of hybridising plants. It might be well'to induce Mr Pink to join the councils of those who have the rust in wheat questionnow under their consideration. ' (Continued on page 11.)