STOCK AND GRAZING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2323, 8 September 1898, Page 6

STOCK AND GRAZING NOTES.

By D.ROYEB. Weekly Stock Sales : Invercargill, Tuesdaysj Eurnsice, Wednesdays Monthly: \ Ashburton, Tuesdays ™,v tn , -p , , Addington, Wedneiays t^*"* o*'0 *' Fcrtn iqhtly : Pel iodically : Balclutha, Fiidaya Heriot.Kelso, and KycClove, Tuesdays j bura. Oamai'u, Tuesdays. | fComranzications of iuterest to stockbreedery and dealers ere cordially invited. All JommumciUions to reach Witness oftioe not later tban .Uonday mt'ht.l Over 200 cattle were yarded at Bur'nside last week, most of which were half finished, j and a large proportion poor and inferior. Prime beaf was decidedly scarce; in fact, overything fit for the butcher, either prime i ,or medium, was briskly competed for. One ! ,or two Very prime brought over \ | £11, prime brought £9 10s to £10 ss, and light weights in fair order £8 to £8 10s. All the half fat cattle went at moderate rates, demand being slack. Inferior were quite neglected, and Hie sooner some of thorn go to the boilers the better, I should say, for the owners. There seems little doubt that prime i beef is likely to command fair rates for some j time. Biilchers arui grcaiers from North j Otago continue to visit Burnside, and it will J be some time before fat cattle are as plentiful j. in the Oamaru district as usual. In Canterbury, fat cattle continue to be in very short supply, and were it not for the , weekly supply of about 30 fat North Island i bullocks, prime beef would hardly be seen at J Addington. Mt Garforth, who always seems to have some of the best, sent two very prime bullocks -to Addington, which brought £13 and £14- respectively. : i I notice that several writers in the Witness j and other papers are pointing out the advan- . | tages of ensilage, and it .seems to me that it j is about time farmers all over took this matter ] ' up. The present scarcity of prime beef is due, ! j no doubt, to last season's drought in some j measure, but the drought was not general, j J snd winter feed should in some places be | plentiful instead of very scarce, if me matter | of saving surplus summer and autumn feed ] Iby ensilage were attended to. At the present j j time, too, feed for dairy cattle seems to have | , run out, and in many quarters the cows are • ! suffering severely. Tne loss entailed through [ j this want ot foresight is serious. Not only is ! butter in short suppry, but these cattle will j have to make up condition at the owner's exJ penpe by lessened milk supply this season, j j Large supplies oi butter from the North , island come now to this market, and have , come all the season. Under proper condi- J j tions, involving the provision of proper win- i ; ter feed, I f-ee .ao reason why Southland and i | Otago cannot feed their own populations with , butter, and also ba in a position to take advan',tage of Australian and other outside markets i ! which we have been hitherto unable to do. i , If tho dairy industry is to prosper in the future, il will only be through an improved i method on the^e lincf. Six months of a dairy 1 season will not clj us much good. We must j get more out of the cows, or take a back I seat. : j There is nothing new in the&e remarks, for i I have Paid the same thing often before, and all the be&t authorities on the platform and in the pi ess 'have persistently tried to hammer it in for j'cara without anything like adequate results, only a very few attending to the suggestions given, but lhe?e few are successful men. This is what a Canterbury pajier says: — "The fcurcity of fat stock in Canterbury is daily becoming more apparent, and i with the shortness of feed there is little prospect of any improvement here for some time to come. At the Addington yards last week most of the be?t sheep and cattle came I from outside this province, and the North j Island was well represented, both in fat-bul-locks and heavy-weight sheep, while South Canterbury and Otago and Southland wcie also responsible for a good many of the be&t sheep in the market. The yarding of sheep at Addington was [ smaller than usual. The North Island sheep were very fine, and came from the Wanganui district. They were Lincoln - Romney cross, were heavy i sheep, and the butchers took them at i 18s sd. Prime freezers were scarce, and ranged between 15s and 17s 6d. I notice in J the list of sales the following: — Southland j client, 60 crossbred wethers 17s 4d to 18s Id, j maiden ewes, 16s lid to 17s ; North Otago ! client, 160 crossbred wethers 14s lid to 16s lOd ; J. Graham, "Woodlands, f. outhland, 230 crossbred wethers 16s Id. I Under ISOO sheep were yarded last week at Burnside, the bulk medium and light-weights, the few prime sheep beina; tatosn by butchers

jat 16? 6d to 17s sd. Owing- to the decided ' scarcity of prime mutton and the small yard- , ing, buyers had to content themselves with medium, and these brought 11s 6d to 13s. In Otago and Southland feed prospects as | yet don't encourage any buying in store sheep, ( but in Canterbury, although feed as yet is i backward, forward sheep bring fair rates. j Half bred ewes in lamb have brought up to 12s, crossbred wethers 10s to 12s 6d. At Burnside market pigs continue in small t supply, prices for prime porkers and bacon pigs being- A{d to 4£d. .In Canterbury supplies are more plentiful, but the demand keeps pace at the same rates. I anticipate a very , active demand for young and store pigs. New ! Zealand baconcurers are unable to fill orders j from Australia, and there is plenty of enJ couragement to those who don't despise this branch of farm produce. In grain, oats continue to sell briskly, and • considerable shipments go regularly, so that I prices should at least be well maintained. j Wheat is quiet; millers have shown a little | more willingness to buy lately, but are in j hopes of filling their requirements at lower j rates. Holders, however, don't generally show !-any- inclination to reduce the price. j The potato market is brisk again, awl Sydney buyers continue to operate. It seems likely that further shipments Mill be required for Manila. Those will be supplied by Sydney merchants with New Zealand potatoes. It seams to me thai we are rather a sleepy lot in regard to the development of our export trade. We are jusllyproud af our Union S.S. Company, and occupy a commanding position jas a maritime colony. We have in abundance 1 the products required for the supply of these ( new markets, but we seem to lack the enterj prise t'rat originally made and developed j these colonies in which we live. Or is it that [ large steamship companies ha-ve destroyed all i private enterprise? If so il is a great pity. J - Regarding the London butter market* Messrs j Weddel and Co. say the Copenhagen official quotation has remained at £0s to £ss, and trade is reported as quiet. Only once in the last 10 years has the quotation for the first j week in July been as low as it is this j r ear, . and this occurred in 1894-, when it was 745. Last year at this time it was 925, and rej mained at that figure all through July. It J is undoubtedly the large increase in the Home i make that is regulating prices. Since the Ist I January this year Ihe import of butter is less i than last year. Russia, Sweden, and the United t States have during June sent 1000 tons less than last year ; Denmark, France Holland, i and Canada have sent over 1000 tons more. Evidently our rabbit industry is not helping til dairy farmers ; or at least it is apparently affecting prices of dairy produce, more espeJ cially chease. • The C.C. and D. Company report : — Cheese : J There has been practically no improvement in the market since our last report until last week, when prices on this firmed up a little. Large shipments of new Canadian and States cheese ' have arrived and have come forward in good condition, but buyers are so far only b.uying ' from hand to mouth with very little evidence ■ of pluck to operate more freely. With tho . ' prospects' of a Largo home production and the . growing popularity of cheap meats, especially i that commodity — frozen rabbits — of the last ' three years' mtroduclion, we see little prospect* jof higher prices ruling for cheese. Intrinsic- : ally, cheese are dirt cheap at current rates, j but the slump and disappointment in last ' season's Septembers and the disastrous windI ing-up has at present curbed buyers from en- ' tering into forward contracts. New Zealand ! Cheese: There are now very few New Zealand i cheese on the market, but the finest qualities ! command if anything a little better price than [""Canadians ; anything, however, off in the ' flavour is cut do-\\n in price by the new Cana- \ dian and States offering. Veiy little, if any, t money has been made by sellers during the last four weeks, new cheese at the current rates having been lower than ' prices given c.i.f. Margarine : Business remains about the same, but with the present prices of finest imported j butters there are not quite such a ready de- | mand for best mixtures. | Messrs Weddel and Co. report : — Cheese : . The market is in a very depressed condition, ! end thougli holders arc asking 36s to 37& for I both old and new Canadian, some of them at i least are willing to accept as low as 355. C.i.f. ! offers from Canada at 36^ and upwards find no response here, yet those who would buy at this figure, unless for immediate iise, would surely be safe from loss. The price in the immediate j future is of course uncertain, but for f-ie more [ distant future prices must be considerably higher than at present. The following from the Grocer if worth miking a note of. Especially let us beware of those who are ad\cc filing the doing avvay with the grading and marking' of our bo.ye— In the present state of the London market and witlv the large supplies to hand, New Zealand, by going bad; to wr-al obtained bei'ore the days of Government grading, could ea&ily have her trade deslioyed. i\o mnllcr now large supplies may be, there will always be "room on top," but lower qualities will always suffer in proportion to ihe heaviness of supplies. The C4rccei pays: — German Butler. — The export of German butter to England, which has been gradually decreasing sinre 189+, rhowed in 1897 a stiil more decided reduction. A report to the Foreign Office Fays that only 24-77 lons of butter were exported, compared with 5305 tons in ISO*. The reason for ll'is decrease i& puppose'l to be ihe doubt which exists in I4ngl.in 1 as to the purity of the German butter. In previous years Germnjiy rent much inferior and middling butter to England, and, although she now only sends smaller quantities of finest quality, she still tuffcrs from her reputation. The German, dairies are either unable or unwilling to supply the superior butler in sufficient quant it ie?, fov the butter exchange in Hamburg, 133- which the trade to ISngland is principally transacted, complains constantly of the inferior quality™ of the butler deliveied as " prime goods." Now that the Hamburg sanitary authorities have instituted a regular examination of the butter, and have seen. 'thai each cider baars an official certificate, the export has coiisiderably mcreaped. Bui it is easier to lofc a good name than to make it or to recover it. With butler arriving from the most distant parts of the world, as is the case nowadays, it does not do for producers in any country to risk verifying the old proverb which says you may as well hang a dog as give him an ill-name. Another extract from the same paper is interc3ting, and gives some idea of the larga though evcr-increa&ing market we have tf

supply, and it rests Tvilh ourselves to see that we lu.ve the full share. We ought to have. And this means something far and away beyond what we have yet attained to : — Our Food Supplies From Abroad. — The statistics issued a few days ago regarding the quantities and values of various forms of , agricultural pioduce impcited into the United {Kingdom reveal a further increase over those of the immediately preceding year alike in the groups of live animals, of dead meat, of ■ dairy produce, of eggs, and of poultry. Measured in aggregate value, the payments , made for imports\>f animal produce in 1897 , exreeded £71,500,000, which in a larger total than has before been recorded, the more ma- i terial in creates over 1896 being in round irumhecs nearly £1,000,000 in live animals imported for food, £2,500,000 for dead meat, and £1.800,000 for dairy produce. Cattle ' imported alive in 1897 numbered 618,000 head, j and the sheep 612,000. These animals repre- j sent in thq" aggregate an addition to the meat supply of the year of something 'like 4,500,000cwt, while the beef, mutton, bacon, liams, and other forms of imported meat wero ! over 14,700,000cwt. These two classes of sea- j "borne meat together exceeded by 1,650,000cwfc j •the nieat imports of 1896, mid, collectively, ] supplied a ration of 541b per head of the j population, against a foreign supply of 401b , per head on the average of the five years j 1891-5. These figures suggest a further devel- j opment of the meat-consuming power of the ' population. The conditions of the year poiirt j to the consumption of 1311b by each unit of the people, as against an average of 1221b per annum, in the quinquennium of 1891-5, as much as 41 per cent, of the whole being the produce of other countries, and 59 per cent, furnished by the cattle, sheep, and swine of the United Kingdom itself. The wheat imports of 1897 were less than in any calendar year since 1890, and less by 531b per head of j the inhabitants of the United Kingdom than J in the previous year. The dead neat imports are, as formerly, more than half of American origip ; three-fourths of the fresh beef im- j ported, and more than two-thirds of the bacon and hams imported being also of j American production. The supplies from Australasia are next in magnitude, twn - thirds of the mutton coming from ■this quarter. In 1897 America sent to the United Kingdom a total wheat supply larger than in 1886, being 61 per cent, of the whole against only 42 per cent, of the large wheat imports of 1895.