AGRICULTURAL AND PASTORAL NEWS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2202, 14 May 1896, Page 4

AGRICULTURAL AND PASTORAL NEWS.

In connection with the Ofcago Agricultural and Pastoral Society's third annual wiutee show of cheese, butter, grain, seeds, &c. we have been asked to draw attention to the large number of classes in the grain and roots section for farmers only, for which ' liberal prizes are offered. We understand a good programme is arranged and that liberal coa»~ cessions on the usual fares have been grantedby the Railway department, available for the week* It is proposed to publicly lay th» foundation stone of the new Agricultural Hall * on the- first day of the show, and eereral lectures will be given during tbe week on agricultural and dairying mvUers, which should p-ove of gre*t interest to farmers. The efforts of the socitty ehould meet with approval, and t is to be hoptd th&t farmers will respond by giving large entries and their hearty ■ Bupport. Mr J. R. Gharlton, V.8., in a letter to the Lyt feel ton Times, expresses the opinion that if • the Duaedin Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals seta about the total RbJilHou of the praotice of dehorning c*tUe it • will lasd itielf in n sea of trouble, diminish its popularity, limit its usefulaess, and eventually suffer defeat. Unfortunately, he says, the operation is sometimes performed unskilfully, and is then associated with nos dkss pain, and , had the committee confined itself to the prevention of this it would ba keeping well within ~ its legitimate province and de.-erve the support! - of all ; but the operation properly performed is not cruelty technical nor legal, nor is it contemplated in the letter or spirit tif the Ctuelty to Animals Acts. The slight pain attendant on dehorning sinks into absolute inriguiQcanca before the torture and damage caused by horns iv stock and sale yards, &c and in transit by . rail and sea ; whilst its legality his been affii mr-d by such authorities as Lord* MLaren, Tmyuor, Wellwood, Kjllachy, and the Lord Justice Clark in the Justiciary Appeal Court of Scotland.

Dr Martin reported to the Wellington City Council that some meat ' shown him was diseased. It was a case of tubercular pleurisy, and the meat was or.flfc foe human food. A prospcution is likely to follow. He »l-r> reported a case of tjp'oidfever in a dairy. The patient was kept in the house for nearly a fortnight, which be thought dangerous to the public health— a oontingonoy which was not reached by the Dairy Regulation Acts. Sheep-stealing is stated to be extensively , carried on in the Eketahuna district;. A trhl ship™ nt of 200 aaokg of oats, specially di 1 . n»cd for the Loudni market, is being eenb Home in the Bitcffshire by Messrs MacQibboo and Son?, of Mattura. Mr Henry Gill, of Oamard, while killing , pigs, was seized by one of the animals and had the third finger of the left hand pulled oleaa out of the socket. The Owakft Dairy Factory is said to be turning out 2501b of butter daily. On Friday 150 caeca of cheese were despatched from Bdendale for shipment to Lon- ' don. This included 10 special cases in which * tbe cbeese is made up in the form of a cub a, to secure greater economy in packing. The threshing season this year has, says tha Tapanui Courier, been noted for exceptionally , fat'guing hours for the workmen and great competition amongst mill-owners. Th«T. have been a large number of mills available all season, and the work went through with scarcely a break caused by the weather. Most of tha mill-owners had a fair season, the old hands of course retaining good runs. As the farmf ra are always eager to have threshing over, this prevents a monopoly for any owner, and const quently the mills all ceased work about the same time. Needless to say, with good weather, some records h&ve been put up, and one of tha best we have heard was accomplished by Mr W. , Waugh's mill, in charge of Mr James M'Neil.' Thi* mill was engaged threshing Mr W. Caffell'a portion of the heavy o»t crop obtained by the croppers on Moa Flat estate. In 43 hours 1844 Ings were put through, the bes6 day's run being 626 bags in 14-£ hours, thiitime including two shifts of the mill, which* would reduce the actual working time by ad ; least an hour. At four and a-half bushels to the bag, it will be seen that the above performance is not a bad one. The crop threshed : was estimated to jield from 85 to 90 bushels to tha acre. '

The Christcburch Press has been interviewing a gentleman who is on a visit to New Zealund on matters code ?ning the frozen meat, jn'histry, a»d, our ooiiteuiporay says, tha informafcion thus gathered tended toempbaatsb a remark he made that' Australia is playing and may be expected to play no nnimportaut part in the frozen meat trada of the world. The gentleman alluded to if Mr R. B. Grange, son of Mr T. Grange, of Lyttet* ton, who has attained experience in respect ta refrigerating operations in Australia ; and he thus Bummarisea our strong aud weak pointw :— So fur as up-to-date machinery v concerned,. New Zealand is behind Australia, where tim

ammonia process has become fsirly established) j and ia carried on in nearly every factory by the < latest machines. The Hercules appeared' to him to take the leading pines an'l give the best . results, and he noticed that Belfast aud Islington were now supplied with one each of 70 tons. The ammonia prooees was so far the moat economical yet adopted in" the -colosie*, and as everything was cut so fine, economy needed to be practised in eve>y reasonable manner. In every other respect he believed that the New Zealand companies taught those of Australia a lesson. In the matter of killing, dressing, grading, and haudliug Australia could learn something. In the first place, it had to be reroem-' bered that Australia had not the same climate, and in the second they bad not the same class of sheep besides their sheep did not look so well after dressing. An error into which they had fallen, but which was now being remedied, was in the matter of grading by weight and colour. If a client sent down a line of sheep they wtre killed, dressed, put into the room, and branded alike, whether they were 60!b or 301b, and of course this must affect the values when the meat was placed on the market. It ' appeared also to him that better results were obtained by reason of the killing being done on the same property as that on which the freezing, grading, and branding took place. There wbb, comparatively spiking, little killing doce in Sydney. Tho large companies had their shetp or cattle slaughtered at their country or feeding depots, and the carcases were forwarded to the main depots In ice trucks. The only killing done in Sydney was at the Government abattoirs, where the operation was carried out by contract by the carcase butchers', and there the sheep were oeilair.ly not dressed as well as in ' NVw Zealand. To sup-rvise the work so thoroughly as could be doce by the private firms on their own premises would mean a large and more expensive st&ff than at present supervise the establishment. The cover in which frozen meat is sent to the Home country is being utilised in a peculiar mauner. A Home paper thus tells the tale :—: — " As a humble manifestation of the way in which men eager for a liviDg adopt new opportunities, the writer may mention the very considerable and growing trade in ' meat cloths ' — that is, the cloths of a peculiar fabric in which frozen mutton it wrapped when it arrives from abroad. This cloth, when the frozen meat trade was in its infancy, was carelessly stripped from the carcases and either thrown away or used in the wiping of the blocks and slabs in butchers' shops. Ibis estimated that in this way thousands upon thousands of pounds' worth were wasted. Now, however, at any butcher's shop, no matter how small, eager agents call and bid for the cloths and a very prosperous industry is the result. These cloths are of a thiii and fine texture, and when ready fat the market, after a varitty of treatment by the pureha'ers, they ar^eold*' in large numbers to litb. graphtrs needingvvery toft fabric for wiping the lithographic stones, that will nob in any circumstances acrajtch them, As to the treatment of the cloths,^ the grease is in the first place extracted from them, this alone yielding & revenue, and then a bleaching-process euftxtes. The man who first hit upon their utilisation experimented with the cloths in a half -boar ted naapner to begiu with, bat when he discovered their value he kept bis secret for a long time, and bojgbiup great quantities of thr-m. This astute individual eoorj found himself miking a very c om-ideYable living, and now the cl<. tbs are sent all over Europe to the great lithographic *pii-.'<-rs, who did not, for along time aftfir they had l>etn using them, know that the new ma • .if- 1 h'&d not been specially manufactured.

An .nquirer writes: — "What authority have BtecU inspectors to kill stock that they suspect to be troubled with congestion of thelnngs P The inspector confessed that he coulffWt tell what -*as the matter with a beast of mine that he had sentenced to deaih, but m'ght'do so .after it was dead. I brought » veterinary But> gcon to examine the animal — an ox— t»ut he' aaid it only had a chill, and would be all right in a day or two. . At a matter of fact myaelf,and my family have' been using the flesh of the animal on the assurance of the veterinary surgeon that nothing ailed the animal to rentier it deleterious for human food. What .remedy have I go* 'or the evident wanton avid wilful destructi< n of my aaimal ?" • A movement ie on Foot in Sydney to introduce A tyt tv of selling stock at the salsyards at so much per lb live weight, instead of so much per heed. ■ <■ A village settler in the Bairnsdale district, ] Victoria, planted three acres with the small black (Russian) sunflower, from which he lias harvested over 30 bags, containing 1751b of seed each. At the offered price of 3£d per lb this would give a return at the late of £25 per nere. Mr James Craigie, of Kingsdown, near Tiuoaru, has threshed 80 acres of wheat at an average of 55 busbels per acre. There were four pacidecks, and Tußcan yielded 52 and 60, ' velvet chaff 62, and red chaff 63 bushels per acre. We (Clutha Free Press) have had the pleasure of in-yecting a new stjleof oil engine, imported by Mr Watt for Mr JohnMosley, of Inchclutha. The engine, which ia a very nice piece of mechanism, is nomiually 1 h.'p , but is capable of developing a good deal more power. It does iti work with a consumption of a pint of kerosene per hour. The engine is called the *' Monarch Oil Bngine,"and runs smooth'y and practically noiselessly. For f arnf use no better form of power could be employed, and »s there is no steam boiler there is no danger from exgloakta, «od any intelligent boy could roa taw

engine. It requires no .further attention after starting than to keep the oil reservoir supplied. This is the first oil engine of the class in the colony ; but it will not be long before Mr Mojl(/y's neighbours will go in for the same thing. The utility of ssich an engine ie apparent, and the prico is only that of a good horse.

A writer in the Mark Lane Express states that turpentine is a sure cure for the turnip fly. By putting half a gill of turpentine in 201b of swede seed and soaking it overaight before sowing, ho says, no one need be afraid of the flj ; it may and will settle on it and perforate an occasional leaf, but does not injure tbe plant. Paraffin or other strong smelling oils will not answer, as the soent flies off. If you squeeze the leaves of the plant the seed of which has been dressed with turpentine, you will find they smell strong until the plant gets into rough leaf, when the fly will not touch it. | The Oitmarn Mail says that as a resulb of a trial order of cheese to one of the principal firms in Sydney the Pukeori Dairy Factory Company have just' received a cable rnrssage ordering a very large shipment to be sent there. At a meeting of the guarantors of the Gore Dairy Factory held last week, Mr John MacGibbon, chairman of directors, said that the consideration by the eub-oommittee of methods of forming a new company had resulted in the following proposal: That a oompany with a nominal capital of £2000 in £1 shares be floated, with the object of securing the premises and plant of the Gure Dairy Factory Company, which are advertised for sale. Each of the guarantors of £50 shonld take 50 £1 shares in lieu of paying the amount of their respective bonds. Of the shares, it was proposed that Is 3d should be paid on application and Is 3d on allotment, the balance in calls of not more than Is per share, at intervals to be fixed by the directors of the new company, such intervals, however, not to ba less than three months. The chairman explaiued that £600 could at once be obtained on the security of the property, and had no doubt but that other £600 could be raised by debentures secured on the uncalled capital. The ecbeme was formally approved of, and those present (19) signed an agreement to take 50 shares each. Of the progress of the movement in favour of the sale of cattle by live weight in Great Britain tho Leeds Mercury says: — "Scotsmen are very sensible usiug the Cattle Weighing Aot more and more, while English farmers still sell nearly all their live stook under the old system of guesswork. The returns are from the 19 markets scheduled iv the act, 14 being in England and five in Scotland. Oat of 911,652 cattle entering the 14 English markets in 1895 only 27,560 were weighed alive, or a little over 3 per cent. ; while of 274,497 entering the five Scotch markets, 72,473, or over 26 per cent., were put on the weighbridge. In the case of sheep, 15,057 out of 3,299,712 were weighed in England, and 19,829 out of 1,030,544 in Scotland. In that of pigs, 2333 out of 188,016 were put on the weighbridge in Eogland, and 468 out of 45 173 in Scotland. In Leeds, 1302 out of 33,522 cattle, 1447 out of 111,170 sbeep, and 1573 out of 12,328 pigs were weighed ; in Wakufi-ld, 371 out of 91.993 cattle, and no sheep or pigs ; in York, 86 out of 73,514 cattle, no sheep, and only four p'g*. The figures for Gr«at Britain are a little better than those of 1894 or 1893. Indeed, there has been a steady progres* ; but tbe results of the act are f&r short of what might have been expected. Eceu if a stockowner does not choose to sell by live weight, he might take, the trouble to inform himself of the weights of his animals before selling them, instead of msttly guessing the weights."

The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the Dehorning of Cattle. TO THE EDITOE. Sib,— The society has m its wisdom decided to prosecute anyone who is guilty of the operaton of dehorning cattle, on the ground that it is an unnecessary and painful operation, I would suggest to the council of the society that they also take into consideration the equally painful and unnecessary kindred operations of gelding colts, spaying heifers, and cuttiag steers. The dehorning is over in a few seconds, a clean cut with a very sharp powerful instrument. Compare this with the len«thy and far more painful operations of gelding and spaying. In each case the animal is thrown, tied up in a painful manner, and in the former subjected to great pain during the operation, the raw flesh being seared with a hot iron. The subsequent inflammation in bothcaeei is often very grett, especially in colts, and the percentage of deaths very much greater than in dehorning— indeed, in the latter none die from the effects of the operation. Why is it more necessary to spay a heifer or castrate a steer than to dehorn a bullock or cow"? All these operations are performed with the common object of improving the beef. Spaying especially is quite unnecessary. It is done solely with the object of quick fattening. The fact of the matter is, Sir, a great amount of hysterical nousenße has been written on the subject of dehorning, and the council bavo, I f-ii&i", been carried away on the flood.— I am, &c, M»« X T?TAwnn.

Mr A. E. G Rhodes, in response to a requisition, has consented to become a candidate for P&reora, Canterbury, at the next general election. Every one with a garden should grow one of "Nimmo &BlairV Japanese " Crimson Rambler " Roses. It is the wonder of the period in plants. Plants^ BaMrd 2s 64 each.