THE JERSEY BREED.

Otago Witness, Issue 3829, 2 August 1927, Page 19

THE JERSEY BREED.

A CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM. PALMERSTON N., July 29. The annual meeting of the Manawa I’ll Jersey Cattle Breeders’ Association discussed the question of the classification of Jersey cattle according to a standard type. It was decided to circularise the Jersey clubs, stressing the advantage of the proposal. A lengthy report of the c -eeutivc referred to the practice on the island of Jersey, where much had been cl.ieved in the way of standardising their ideal. It was recommended that throe degrees —very highly .commended, highly commended, and commended—be adopted. It was also suggested that the three best-known expert judges of "he type in the Dominion should work until all differences had been adjusted, and then appoint a further three recognised authorities on the type, each to be associated with one of the original .three. These would work in pairs, and, as each got sufficient experience, would be placed in charge of new recruits until there were sufficient competent and standardised experts to curry on the work. CANTERBURY CRAIN AND PRODUCE MARKET. , CHRISTCHURCH. July 29. Yesterday tho potato market showed a shade of firming, and to-clay it was mom pronounced. If had sagged to a low (Klint on Monday and Tuesday, when July deliveries were sold at £4 10s, f.0.b., s.i., but yesterday it improved 2s 6d, and a similar advance took place to-day. For August, £5 was tiie basis of to-day's business, with Septembers at £5 2s 6d to £5 ss. The Wingatui was duo to sail last niirlit with 8090 sacks for the north. The VVaipiata, direct from Timaru with 4500 sacks, has arrived in Auckland on a bare market, and the Katoa is due to sail on Monday or Tuesday. The wheat market is slower. Millers, in view of the reduced prices of offals, ate not operating to any extent. Prices, however, are unchanged. Any wheat still in farmers’ hands is firmly held, and on tho threshing returns there must still be considerable quantities in the country. Pollard and bran have been reduced in price, and are now selling at unr«cally low prices. Quotations are: £6 15s for pollard and £5 for bran, with an extra 10s a ton in each.case, for smaller lots. It is a long time since offals were down to these prices. The cut in the prices is due to Australian competition. The Melbourne papers quote £7 10s and £7 for pollard and bran respectively delivered in the suburbs, and the cabled quotations appearing in the New Zealand papers repeat these prices. Strangely enough, quotations to New Zealand merchants are £5 10s and £4 15s respectively—a reduction of £2 and £2 5s a ton. Oats and chaff are very dull. B Gartons are quoted at 3s 6d and 3s C£d f.0.b., s.i., and, as at 3s 31d the business with Australia has petered out in the meantime, a few fair sized consignments of white oats have gone over apparently for milling. August-September chaff is offering at £5 5s a ton. The northern inquiry is negligible. The present year has been the worst for a long time in (he seed trade. There is an excellent sample of cowgrass this season, and it is worth about lid a lb for machine dressed or 8d on trucks. White clover has not been a heavy crop, but is duller than red, and dressed seed cannot command more thasi Is a lb. This season’s perennial machine-dressed ryegrass is quoted at 4s to 4s 3d, or 2s 6d to 2s 9d. a bushel on trucks. Italian is mentioned as 3s for machine-dressed, or Is 9d on, trucks. AGRICULTURAL ANO PASTORAL NEWS. The mural decorations which were a feature of the New Zealand Court at the Empire Exhibition at Wembley will lie a feature, of the display to be made by the Department of Industries and Commerce at the Christchurch Winter Show and Exhibition, These decorations reached Christchurch on Thursday. Tho secretary of the South Island DairyAssociation received a telegram on Friday as follows: Sales of cheese have taken place in the North Island at S|d, f.0.b., from the time of manuacturc up to the end of December. Woolgrowers and woolbrokers in the Taranaki district appear to be optimistic concerning the new season's prospects ow>

ing to the fact that very little carry-over wool is left (telegraphs our special correspondent). The new season’s clip should be in demand right away. Lambs’ wool is expected to be in good request, particularly as French buyers are reported to be active in their demands for this class of ■wool as well as the heavier carbonising xvools.

Replying to a deputatii from the farmers of the Manawatu district protesting against being compelled to destroy all hawthorn hedges to prevent the spread of fireblight, the Minister of Agriculture (Mr O. .T. Ha when) said that in all probability the disease would destroy the hedges, and the farmers would not have a single apple or pear tree. Hawthorn was a continual source of infection, and it was all a question of what was the best thing to do. They should not allow infection if it could be avoided. Hawthorn hedges and orchards could not go together, and eventually the farmers would have to get Tid of all such hedges. The only method of controlling fireblight was to control the host plant. They had got rid of it entirely in Auckland when they got rid of the hedges. The maize crop in Poverty Bay is reported to be turning out very well (says the Herald), and commercial quarters believe it will be above the average. The growth of the grain has been excellent, and the Poverty Bay staple should prove attractive to buyers. When proposing a vote of thanks to Mr W. J. Polson for his presidential address to the Dominion Farmers’ Conference (reports our special correspondent in Wellington), Mr J. H. Jull (Hawke’s Bay), said that he could not see why farmers should not fix the price at which their - products' should, be sold. When they attempted to buy other things they quickly found that the prices were fixed and fixed high enough, too. Why should not farmers have the same privilege? Those who talked about the inexorable law of supply and demand having an effect on price-fixing, he suggested, were not on very sure ground, as coo] storage and the ability to hold produce in store for a long time were very important factors to be reckoned with.

A Fordell farmer, felling a tree at 10 o’clock on a recent evening, plunged Bulls and Turakina and hundreds of private residences in dar’ ‘-s when it broke down the Power Board’,.; line that supplies th ■

north end of the district (states the Wanganui Chronicle). Without prejudice, the board has decided to accept a settlement if £l2 is paid.

Seven years ago a Wanganui returned soldier took up a section- of farming land not far from the city at £33 per acre. He undertook an impossible task, and a short time ago he notified the mortgagee that he intended to walk off, whereupon the price was reduced to £33 an acre, and he now intends to make another effort. These facts were mentioned at a meeting of the Patriotic Association, when it was further stated that the mortgagee himself bought land some years ago at £43 an acre. “It would have paid him better to have sold the land originally at £5O an acre,” remarked a member, yet another adding that it was not often tho price of land showed a drop of 150 per cent. After a lengthy discussion on the Rural Credit s Bill on Tuesday the New Zealand Farmers’ Union Conference passed a resolution “That in the matter of the rural credit branch of the State Advances Department We urge that the recommendations of the commission be carried out in their entirety and that the sale of bonds be pushed with the utmost ’ urgency. We also urge that a second farmers’ representative be appointed to the board.” The practical assistance given to the organisers of the reoent Hawera Winter Show by the Department of Industries and Commerce is shown by a number of photographs which have been received by the Dunedin office of the department. These depict the various display stands throughout the show, the railings and backings for which were lent by the department. Much of the material came from Wembley and the wall murals, which were apparently a feature of the show, were also the property of the department. Several of the photographs show the display stands of Dunedin manufacturers who took a prominent part in the show.

Counsel, to witness at the Wanganui court (reports the Chronicle): “You are a dairy farmer?” “Yes.” “And how do you find things?” “Quito all right,” replied witness. “I pulled through bad times, and I can pull through now that I have a freehold farm.”

“A farmer never counts his labour, his' wife’s labour, or his boys’ labour; he always gives it in.” This (reports the Poverty Bay Herald) was a remark made ' y Mr K. W. Gorringe at Gisborne when

dealing, with the costs of production. “You have to have a liking for pigs to make a success of them,” declared Mr K. W. Gorringe, instructor, in swine husbandry at the Gisborne winter farm school (states the Poverty Bay. Herald). “Hear, hear,” came a gruff voice. Mr Gorringe went on to explain that a pig could be almost domesticated and quoted an instance of sows following a farmer around the farm • and of the farmer’s little girl being able to ride on a pig’s back without the animal showing any objection. “Cream and milk grading is one of the best things we have ever had,” said Mr W. Hall at a meeting of shareholders of the Waitara-Taranaki Dairy Company the other afternoon (says the Taranaki Herald). “It has,” he continued, “done more to bring about an improvement in quality than any other move that has been introduced during the last 20 years or so. It is much better than having instructors going around the factories.” “I can get one sow from Discoinbe which will wipe out two cows, three cows, four cows, five cows,” said Mr K. W. Gorringe in Gisborne the other morning when commenting on the profit in pigs (says the Poverty Bay Herald). The highest ,eturn from one sow in a year in New Zealand was £327. This, of course, was a pedigree sow. but he said that even dealing with ordinary sorts there was a larger profit in pigs than in cows.