FARM AND STATION.

Otago Witness, Issue 2545, 24 December 1902, Page 16

FARM AND STATION.

(Continued from page 9.)

in a -perfectly clean, dish, until used. The ■udder must be washed -and the teats disinfected, and the hands disinfected, before the milkdng tube is inserted. All tEese extraordinary precautions are necessary to prevent injury to the udder. If foreign, matter or 'certain bacteria are introduced with the instruments or medicine, the udder will become : -inflained, and, perhaps, will be destroyed." A xe^oTt from Washington states that Mr Wilson, the Secretary of Agriculture in the United States, predict* that the price of beef in. America will come down from the extraordinary rates lately current to normal prices before long. Maize-fed cattle, he cays,, have begun to appear in the markets, and they will increase in number every ■week. Retail pricee, he adds, have- already fallen cdnsiderably in western towns, and will shortly drop in the east. Other authorities do not agree with him as to a fall "to ordinary rates. They point to the failure of the Australian sheep supplies, and con- * tend' that, on this account, the British demand for beef will be unusually heavy for some time to come, and <thot prices in tho United States will thus be kept on a comparatively high level. "No," said 'the farmer to the sundowner, "I won't give you a night's shelter, and I won't give you an. order on the cook ; why don't you go to work?" "Work?" was the reply. "I haven't 'done a stroke o' work- Jor 25:yeaxs,"and.here I""am, quite happy and free from care/-*hile you have been workin'einoe jrou were .old enough to drive the cows up from tlie . paddock to ■be milked ; yet hito ye are now with a mortgage on your- farm that keeps ye «lavin' to pay the interest"' 'And the sundowner moved on, leaving 'tße.'fatmer to' do some thinking- — "Along^ the Track," in the leader. ""Numerous inducements are befng held out to agriculturists with a little capital to leave Australia and settle in South' Africa, ibut lieutenant S. Dyke, who has just reiurned from ■ that country, warns intending settlers to consider carefully the question they forsake the Commonwealth. South Africa, he told a representative of the South Australian. Advertiser, is not the agriculturist's paradise some people seem to "believe* The cattle are liable to red water, glanders, mange, strangles, and rinderpes*, and tiie cheep to tick, footrot, and pneumonia. : Even if the settler is prepared to arisk '*H ifceeo obstacles, to success, be has great difficulty in getting a fair-sized I>Uck, and the price is about £3 a morgen (two [English acres). The country, Lieutenant Dyke averts, is not suitable for wheat-grow-ing, and the mealie crops are ii&blo "to damage by redrust, worm rot, ».nj grasshoppers. The last-named play fearful hayoo with the crops just before „ the ripening . period sets in. Another great drawback to agricultural settlement is that the m>^ans- of transport are extremely limited, and the markets are not' easily reached. At the request of Colonel Davis, Lieutenant Dyke wrote » report oh land settlement- in fjouth Australia', and it was forwarded ko lord Mflner, who replied thanking \ the author. The' letter contained a note' of admiration "for" the' 'statesmanship that had built up such liberal land laws,!' but Lord Milnev feared that South African settlers could not be offered such liberal conditions for some time 4o • come. Lieutenant Dyke's* report was' sent on to -the Land Settlement Commission by his Excellency, and that body in turn wrote thanking the author, and promised to act on the lines of the land policy in operation in South Australia. The village settlement scheme is being tried with indifferent success in~South Africa. Most of the settlors have returned to the concentration camps. The American Angora Goat-breeders' Association, which has been only two years in existence, has ovei 40,000 purebrede recorded in its register. There is a growing disposition among the people in the Sacramento "Valley of Californot to abandon "wheat- growing in favour of stock-raising. A number of prominent ranchmen have announced their intention of doing so. A San Francisco paper states that while lower rail and shipping rates promise some improvement in the wheat industry, it is felt that <the increased yield in Oregon, Washington, and Manitoba make the future unattractive. The high price of beef also adds to the boom in stock-raising. Experiments carried out in Germany on the feeding of calves, to teat the relative advantages •of raw and: boiled milk with or without certain salts, are recorded in a bulletin of the French Ministry of Agriculture. The calves made flesh more rapidly wii.i boiled milk than with raw milk, and still faster where a little common salt" (the quantity is not given) was added. The addition of chloride of calcium and a phosphatic salt resDectively" did harm.' "The heavy rain on Monday night and Tuesday morning on the Canterbury Plains (says" last Thursday's Press) was accompanied by a fall of snow on the uplands, and at Methven beans in flower and potatoes were covered up wifeh snow. yesterday's rain was not so heavy, but it was of such a nature as to cause almost abnormal growth in Texetation of all kinds* i&clud-

ing grain, grass, turnips, and clover. Sheepshearing on the stations has been provokingly suspended for at least three days till the sheep's fleeces become dry again. The roads of the country have been "much improved by the rain, as the previous dry weather was loosening the metal. In the Mount Somers district yesterday morningthere was about an inch of snow on the ground. Sir Oswald Mosley 5©5 © example in placing pure-bred bulls at "the disposal of his tenants is worthy of the widest publicity, inasmuch as it merits the favourable consideration of other landowners desirous of promoting the welfare of their tenants and their own estates at comparatively little expense. Two years ago Sir Oswald distributed a number of pedigree young shorthorn bulls among the tenants on his Rolleston estates to be used in their herds, with the accompanying^ intimation that prizes would be offered in due course for the offspring of the sires. The firet show of stock by the Rolleston bulls was held last week (says the Field, November 15), when a thoroughly useful collection of heifers was inspected at the home farm. The object which the sz&nerou3 donor had in view was to raise the standard quality of the cows in the district, and the promising appearance of the heifers begotten by the high-class bulls which his tenants -were privileged to use* free of all charge points to the wisdom and efficacy of the system adopted. There is enormous scope for the effective operation, of schemes of this kind, and we- believe it is only the want of proper initiative and*' organisation that prevents their ( adoption on many estates. /..There is w*. scarcity of .suitable bulls which could be procured at moderate cost, if they are. not bred on 'the estate, and no- doubt the farmers would willingly acquiesce in the arrangement, .although they are difficult to convince as to the advantages of employing high-class bulls, when their doing so involves the payment of highe* service fees. We can conceive no other mtfans by which the same amount of benefit could be conferred at so moderate an outlay to the donor as some such scheme as has been so successfully inaugurated by Sir Oswald Mosley. The country teems with available stock, and if only there could be devised an effectual system of making proper use of them, there would bo less cause to bemoan the exclusion of Canadian 'stores or to comDlain of the inferior quality of the home-bred grazing cattle. Man" and diverse were the ways in which the subjects of his Majesty elected to celebrate the day originally fixed for his Coronation, but few could have been more interesting than that chosen by Mrs Hathaway, of Shenstone Park, Staffs. This lady, who is in her ninety-first year, and can remember four coronations of English sovereigns, decided to celebrate the occasion of the King's Coronation in the dairy in making a cheese which she would offer for his ! Majesty's acceptance. Undeterred by the | sad event which involved the postponement of the Coronation, she proceeded with her intention, and, the cheese having been suc.ce6sfully finished, is now a welcome gift in the Royal larder. The writer of "Agricultural Politics" in the Mark Lane Express says: — Mr Hanbury maybe taken to be strong enough to resist the renewed efforts which are being made to remove the restrictions upon the importation of Argentine cattle into this country. The agitation is chiefly in the interest of the big towns and of the traders dwelling therein. It has no force of public opinion behind it, and it represents no form-ally-indicated public demand. The question of freetrado is not involved at all. If freetrade were involved, then freetrade must be taken to mean the right of a foreign county to introduce disease into this countrr. The whole matter is, as a fact, one of administration rather than one for agitation- Mr Hanbury is in possession of defined facts, and is the representative of a definite principle. That principle is, that England has a right to insist upon explicit guarantees that the admission of foreign cattle into this country shall not also mean the admission of cattle disease. When the Argentine Government yields those exnlicit guarantees, then will be the time for "the agitators to flagellate the Minister for Agriculture with the flail of their resounding oratory. The Hedgehope correspondent of the Southern Standard writes on the 17th inst. : The weather presents no appearance whatever of clearing up, and work of all kinds is consequently at a standstill. The oat crop (if crop it can be called) is In a terrible state-^nevei has it been known to be so backward at this time of year as it is at the present, and with regard to the graßs .croDs, several farmers are turning their sheep into it, fairly disgusted. Writing on the 18th inst., the Centre Bush correspondent of the Southland Times reports: — The weather of late has been so unpropitious that work on the farms is_ completely at a standstill, and turnip sowing is retarded to a very great extent. - Heavy south-westers, accompanied by cold, bitter showers, are being experienced at present,

improvement. It 'is to be sincerely hoped that better weather is immediately in store, otherwise not only will the turnips be very late-sown, but the crops, which are already in a very backward state, will also suffer severely. Some farmers have got a few acres of turnips sown, but- the large majority have not. Last week we had one or two fine growing days, and the crops made a great advance, and at last the farmers were thinking that they were going to get some good weather after all this season. This week, however, suddenly put a damper on everything, and one would think it winter time instead of mid-summer. The oldest residents of the Winton district say they never remember such weather as has prevailed during the last four or five months. Heavy rains with alternating snowstorms were experienced well into October, with the direful results already reported to the lambing; then November gave us high winds and still more rain, with a very few fine days. Now December, though at first generous to the' soil with warmer rains that promoted a fair growth, is treating us to cold wintry rains, that are stopping farming operations generally, and the outlook is not encouraging. — Record. "We are considering a scheme to produce rain by the action of electricity," Mr Garrard said at a meeting of the Sydney Water Sewerage Board. "The proposal has been made by Mr W. A. Gosch* a Sydney electrician, and as his scheme appeared feasible facilities were afforded him' to inspect the catchment area. He asks the board to purchase the necessary apparatus, and will give his services to conduct the experiment without jharge." Mr' Garrard added^that he had referred the * proposal to several scientific m4p, , some of whom were very , much impressed with the practical utility of the scheme. A report on the proposal, prepared by Mr Gosche, was read, and the board decided to defer consideration until next meeting. "The primary purpose of the experiments is to set up a condition of molecular strain on the atmosphere by the agency of electrical radiation." the author says, "which it is anticipated will cause the mist globules to cohere in the proximity of the radiator, resulting in a fall of rain, which will gradually extend. If by some artifioial meaus the globules of liquid which are suspended in the air, and which are evidently kept aparb by a. fine film over their surfaces, could be made to coalesce into drops, these drops, owing to their increased volume, would traverse the intervening non-saturated region of air without being absorbed." Having referred briefly to the successful operations of Japanese scientists, he wrote : "I am induced to believe that my scheme is based on similai lines to that of the Japanese. Ido not propose to deal with a clear sky at the outset of these experiments, but to confine them at first to the type ?f 'Cumuli clouds,' which remain suspended in the air for days, and finally dissipate without discharging their moisture in -the shape of rain." Having inspeoted the catchment area of the Sydney water supply between Appin and Bulli, Mr Gosche selected "Burkes Rock" as the most suitable position -for carrying on the" experiments. Here it is proposed to erect the operating, station at an elevation of 1600 ft above sea level. A portable building is required to shelter the observers and accommodate the apparatus, which comprise a variety of electrical implements measuring instruments and a captive balloon. The latter is to be of sufficient capacity to lift an oil transformer and secondary condenser to the desired altitude. It is also proposed to erect a framework of wires, conical in shape, situated near Sherbrooke. ' Mi Gosohe reserves the actual details of his scheme, which are subject to modifications, but gives the total cost of the necessary apparatus as not more than £500. It is proposed that the experiments he carried out both during the day and night.