FARM JOTTINGS.

Thames Star, Volume LVII, Issue 15127, 18 February 1922, Page 8

FARM JOTTINGS.

! ITEMS or INTEREST. I Has the result of the meat pool proposal been to advance prices? ? The Southland Times questions | claim. It holds that the rises in' | the prices of meat and butter were I due to natural- causes, and that they apply to produce from other countries as well as from this. Figures are quoted in support of the Southland Times’ contention that the demand and other ordinary business 1 process, and not the Government’s j proposed scheme are responsible for | the improved prices. In one way, remarked Mr. G. K. Gorringe, the pig expert, the slump has been of benefit to farmers, for in times when they had plenty of money they did not trouble to attend lectures. Now they are anxious to find out how they can benefit themselves and are willing to attend lectures to learn ways of augmenting their income.

: TREES. i ■ —- “It is better than a life insurance : policy,” remarked an " officer of the Forestry Service when at Palmerston North, in referring to the remunerative results obtained from reafforestation. “Supposing,” he continued, “a farmer wishing to provide an infant son with a stake in 1 after life planted acres of land —not even rich land —with pine trees, and J let them stand for 25 to 30 years. What would be the result? It I cost £6 and £lO an acre to plant trees land reckoning, say, 800 trees to the 'acre—if ' anything, a conservative j estimate —any investment in this -diJ rection is bound to be profitable. It would be a poor tree that would not realise a return of 10s, so that on this ten abres of trefes, 8000 in all, would net' £4OOO for a comparatively small outlay. Surely-this is better than endowment life insurance! To give you an instance of what timber is worth our department recent- ! ly disposed of the milling rights for

five years of over 200 acres of bush land for £SO an acre —-£10,000 cash.”''

BRIGHTER PROSPECTS. S j Even the constable on his beat, jwlio is supposed under regulation to go mechanically about his duties, noticed that something unusual was the matter with the members of the farming community who paid their usual sale-day visit to Wanganui the other day. He was doing his best to keep the good people from the country on the left side of the white line in the Avenue, when a business man remarked that it appeared to be a strenuous undertaking. “Look here, my friend,” replied the constable, “it would take a six-foot barb •wire fence to keep them back from those drapers’ windows to-day. Don’t you know that old ewes and skinny lambs have .gone up over one hundred per cent, in value?” —Wanganui Herald. SOUTH AFRICAN VISITORS.

There are at present visiting Canterbury two students 1 from South Africa —-Messrs. F. Du Toils, of the Orange Free State, and L. P. ,7. Badenhorst, of the Transvaal —engaged in studying the pastoral and agricultural industry. The visitors are beneficiaries under a Union Government bursary scheme, which provides for the subsidising of a twoyear education trip in rural pursuits

to British countries. They left their home in January, 1921, and expect, to land back about next Christmas. So, far, they have studied sheepraising' conditions in Australia and instead putting in some months in New Zealand. During the past fortbight they have visited a number of places around the city' and on Thursday, accompanied by Mr. R. McGillivray, of the Department of Agriculture, inspected the Ashburton agricultural farm and a number of the wheat crops in the district, , the heavy growth of which very much impressed them. The lucerne plots at the farm were a source of keen interest. The visitors will proceed North. , ,