CAPE BARLEY FOR PIGS.

Taranaki Daily News, 5 August 1937, Page 9

CAPE BARLEY FOR PIGS.

OLD FARMER.

(To the Editor.) 1 vSir,— I often wonder, now that grain :of all sorts is so dear and. pigs,. are. quite, a fair price, how it is that people do not; grow ai littte;- Cape "barley. It is a very: easy and safe crop to grow. For man Y; years I .cropped and ran a threshing mill. in South Taranaki, and -it - was quite, usual to grow 50 to 60 bushels to the; here. For many years it was sold at, is' . 6d to 2!s'a bushel.- Even' allowing" for little niore on account of wages, rjnterest j and price of land" this does not aocount; for the difference between 2s and today's price of 6s ,9d. : - j But if a faihnef wanted to top off afew pigs, say, in February and March,. it is very little trouble to put in a couple or three acres Of Cape barley for the pigs. It can 'be cut with a mower when' ripe and stacked and then fed out to pigs. They will not waste any." Care -, must be taken that it is Cape barley and, not the English or two-rowed eort, .as - that does not yield so well. Also ihe birds are destructive on it. Cape barley can be sown broadcast and buried with the disc harrows if one does not possess a drill. With 3cwt of superphosphate "to the acre it will do well on almost any land. I have grown it two or three years in succession on the same, land, and the last crop. was the best, of the lqt. .It wais taken off" early ,inj. February and a good crop of greeri oatss was sown for green feed. It can be depended on. One great thing is in its. , favour is that it comes.m just right -for: topping off the pigs when milk ,is going; down.— I am, etc.;

Manaia, Aug. 4. . :