NOTES FOR FARMERS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5765, 8 January 1897, Page 4

NOTES FOR FARMERS.

Heavy rains in the south last week relieved the apprehensions of drought which were felt there, and there is every prospect of a good harvest. No news has been received from central Otago, where the drought was extremely severe, threatening the fruit crop with destruction. There has also been heavy rain on the West Coast, but all other parts of the colony report a continuance of hot, dry weather, which has destroyed crops and grass in all but the most favoured situations. The month of September and the first three weeks of October in England were very wet, and interfered witli wheatsowing, so that the expectations that a largely increased acreage would be sown in that grain were thought not to have been realised, .although the advance in prices had been a certain stimulus to wheat growing. A special correspondent of the London Daily Telegraph has had an interview with Mr M'Kinley, and as a result he writes advising "British wool merchants and woollen manufacturers that, before another year is out, there will be a considerable addition to the duties under those schedules." Experimental farms was a subject considered by a recent conference of Tasmanian agriculturists. It was resolved to recommend the Government, instead of confining experiments to one or two colleges, to establish a series of experimental plots in various parts of the colony, upon the farms of approved agriculturists, with whom agreements could be made for land and labour, and that the experimental plot system should be under the general direction and superintendence of an expert appointed by the Department of Agriculture. A wise recommendation. Texas is prohibited by its constitution from embarking in public works for irrigation or similar purposes. Yet it owns all the lands within its borders, and but for this restriction might carry out to a successful issue a comprehensive irrigation system. It could not fail to accomplish far more and at less expense than can be done by corporations and individuals, encouraging as their progress has been. Thelatest official returns show that in the United Kingdom there are 10,942,000 cattle, 2,116,000 horses, 30,854,000 sheep and 4,300,000 hogs, an increase all around over the previous year, notably in sheep, which show a gain of over 1,000,000 head. During the first eight months of last year the United States exported J>Boo,ooo worth of agricultural implements. The following remedy for choking cattle is given in the American Agriculturist as one that has never been known to fail: — If the substance is so large that it lodges in the throat, get some one with a small hand to take it out, but if it gets started down the guzzle, throw a large spoonful of powdered saltpetre on to the roots of the tongue. As soon as this has had time to dissolve, or in fifteen or twenty minutes, the substance will go down without any further trouble, aa the saltpetre causes the guzzle to stretch so that anything that will go down the throat will go clear down. An old-established English journal says : — Madame Pommery, the wellknown champagne growel, had unfortunately been induced to breed wild rabbits in an enclosed vineyard of about twenty acres. In a short time they increased to the extent of a veritable pest, and threatened destruction to the adjacent wine vaults by their continual burrowing. In her distress, the owner applied to M. Pasteur, who sent one of his pupils to the place, armed with some recent " culture " of the microbe of fowl-cholera. This was mixed with some food spread for the rabbits, and quickly consumed. On the following day all the rabbits were dead, mostly dying in their burrows. This mode of death is said to be quite painless. The, animal affected wraps itself up in a ball and dies, to all appearance in a painless sleep.