FARM AND COUNTRY NOTES.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8178, 3 May 1919, Page 2 (Supplement)

FARM AND COUNTRY NOTES.

THE FARM.

Quite a number of white clover crops have been harvested in the Greenstreet district this season. The red c'over is very late. Many fields have only just been cut, while a large percentage ;s only flowering.

The threshing mills in the Ladbrooks district, Canterbury, are still busy putting through the balance of the late crops of peas and wheat. The results are very satisfactory, the average being, wheat 50 bushels, and peas 40 bushels to the acre.

The following remits have been passed by Wairarapa Farmers’ Union branches at their annua! meetings:— That the attention of the Railway Department be drawn to the fact that the Governmen grader lias reported to certain factories that their cheese has arrived in ccol stores, Wellington, with large pieces out of the cheese. That seeing that the cattle tick and ‘warbles’ have already been introduced into this Dominion, the attention of the Agricultural Department be drawn to the fact that a stricter examination of stock in quarantine is necessary.

A German-owned business for extracting lanoline or wool grease from wool taken over by the U.S.A. Government at the outbreak of war is remarkab'e for its suggestiveness to New Zealanders who are on the look-out for post-war enterprises. The business referred to was evidently carried on very extensively, as the plant included a “ battery" of 44 Sharpies wool-grease separators, and an inspection indicated that they were a.l! kept fully employed The commercial possibilities of wool grease have not so far as we know been serious'y taken into consideration in New Zealand, and it is believed that to those capable of dealing with this valuable by-product there is a ready field waiting to be utilised.

About 100,000 freight carcases of frozen meat will be loaded at Lyttelton this week, thus considerably relieving the congestion of cold storage space in some of the Canterbury freezers. Instead of taking butter and cheese, as previously stated, the Hororata will take 50,000 freight carcases, and the Port Armour is booked for a similar quantity. Both vessels are also taking a large quantity of wool, and the Hororata is to lift 7,000 haies, as well as 2,000 cases of preserved meat. The unexpected relief to the cold storage space puts a brighter aspect on the freezing industry for the time being. The position became so acute that last week .it some of the Canterbury works frozen meat was being stored in the freezing chambers, the cold stores being full up. Were it not for the system adopted about two years ago of cutting the mutton carcases into two, and telescoping them, thus saving a third of the space, the position this season would have been more acute than it was, and several works would not have been able to cariv or. so long. As it. is, tbe space in the co'd storage quarters is so congested that the cutting up has to be done, at much inconvenience, in the cooling rooms off the slaughtering boards.

This has been a particularly favourable season for some of the crops in the outlying partis of the country. In the Douglas (Taranaki) district, for example, turnips are looking remarkably well and it is quite refreshing to see such a great extent of country under such a favourable aspect. Many of the paddocks are of considerable area and the crop gives promise of a generous yield cl winter feed. As a whole the live stock is looking well and much interest is being evinced by the settlers in the proposed extension of the harbour at New Plymouth.

The war has been responsible for a gradual change in the character of Norwegian agriculture. Owing to the shortage of foodstuffs the country is now in a large measure given over to tillage. Formerly it was devoted chiefly to pasture. Statistics pub’ished show that as compared with 1907 the area under the plough has been increased by 133,644 acres net, or roughly by 26 per cent. The principal increases are in wheat, 24,731 acres; rye, 4353 acres; barley, 65,9>9 acres; oats, 99,043 acres; mixed wit-i rye, 13,525 acres; potatoes, 38,016 acres. There has been a decrease of 111,461 acres in crops not specially indicated, leaving the net increase as stated. There has been a general decrease in live-stock (excepting horses and poultry), ascribed, among other causes, to the impossibility of importing feeding stuffs. This has necessitated the slaughtering of a large number of animals.

A writer in Hoard’s Dairyman says : - Agricultural America has learned many lessons during the war, not the least ef which is the value of organisation. That she was able to the world was due, in the first place, to the patriotic devotion of her farmers as they bent their back to the task. However, even with this we would have failed had there not been organisation and direction. Three days after the declaration of war Secretary Houston met the agricultural extension workers at St. Louis, and this conference drew up a programme of food production and conservation that was shortly adopted by Congress. In this programme definite consideration was given to the perfecting of the organisation of our agricultural agencies. The agricultural extension service was made a permanent and nation-wide system, and it lias so developed that President Wilson recently described it as “the greatest practical and scientific agricultural organisation in the world.” Congress was sufficiently impressed that it made a. special and additional appropriation of over four million dollars, so that in 1917 the total funds available ter agricultural extension were 12 million dollars, and in the present year 15 million dollars. This latter sum is made up of 6,200,000 dollars as the national war emergency appropriations, 4,680,000 dollars from the operation of the Smith-Lever Act, 2,500,000 dollars from counties, and the remainder largely from agricultural colleges. These appropriations live provided for a rapid expansion. which is indicated by the fact that on April 1, 1917. there were 2149 extension workers, of whom 1461 were countv agents; on July 1. 1918. this number increased to 6216. which inc’uded 3001 county agents. 2034 home-demonstra-tion agents and 1181 boys’ and girls’ club workers.

INTERESTING TO DAIRY COMPANIES.

AND THEIR POWERS.

A MATTER OF GREAT INTEREST, A case having an interesting bearing on the powei s of co-operative dairy companies was heard at the Palmerston Supremo Court hy Mr. Justice Chapman, when Gore Bros., farmers, sued the Newbury Dairy Company for £l7B 19s, for butter fat supplied. Mr. Loughnan appeared for the plaintiffs, and Mr. G. Moore defended. The defence was based on the noncompliance of the plaintiffs with a provision under the company’s articles requiring the shareholders to supply the whole of their season’s milk supp'y to the company, till the capital value of each share was paid up. Evidence was given on behalf of the plaintiffs by Thomas Gore, who stated that they had discontinued their supply because on one occasion the company had found fault with the quality of their milk and refused to accept it' Thereafter they had separated their own milk and taken the cream to one of Messrs. Nathan and Co’s, factories.

For the defence evidence was given by the defendant company that the plaintiffs had not supplied the whole of their season’s milk, and consequently they had been fined £9O, at the rate of £1 per cow. The balance of plaintiffs’ claim had been paid into Court. A legal point was raised by Mr. Loughnan that the articles of the association were not in the circumstances binding on the plaintiffs. In the course of his judgment His Honour said it had been agreed that tiie articles did not bind a supplier of milk merely because he was a shareholder. It was evident, however, that the eonstitntionof the company only contemplated men becoming shareholders because of the advantages thereby given to them as shareholders in connection with the supp'ying of milk. In the same way, from the company’s point of view, its objects could only be effected by means of contracts. The subject, therefore, of the mutual rights and obligations of the company and of the shareholders and suppliers was intimately connected with the very purpose of the incorporation of the company, and the .articles, as was clearly intended, • could form, and did form, a contract between the company and the individual shareholder. As for the question of fact, the Judge held that the plaintiffs had given the company grounds for refusing to take certain milk tendered to it, and that plaintiffs were not justified in refusing or neglecting to go on supplying niilk in proper condition. Judgment would therefore bo given for the defendant company with costs on the lowest scale. CO-OPERATIVE DAIRY COMPANIES. RELATIONSHIP WITH SUPPLIERS. A case of considerable importance to dairy companies and suppliers, was heard at Palmerston Magistrate’s Court The Whakaronga Dairy Co., claimed from J. B. and A. Cooper, farmers, Whakaronga, the sum of £2O, representing a call of 2s on eacli of 200 shares made .by the company on its milk-sup-plying shareholders. It was contended on behalf of the defendants that they had been perfectly willing to become milk-supplving shareholders, and had supplied milk till, as counsel put it, they had been absolutely driven away bv the action of the directors in deducting one penny per lb. on butter-fat supplied by them until such time as they would consent to sign an agreement binding them to supply tiie Whakaronga factory. The defendants were technically non-supplying shareholders, and were now sued as such, but they had been prevented from continuing as suppliers by the act of the directors. When the directors persisted ir making the deduction the defendants discontinued supplying the company. They had originally taken over the shares from the party from whom they had purchased their farm. The company had put through the transfer of these shares to the defendants without making any mention oi their having to sign an agreement binding them to supply the Whakaronga factory for a certain them. The defendants were now supplying Nathan’s factory, and the shares in question were absolutely unsaleable. They were not entitled to dividends, and they got no benefits from them. On the grounds of “equity and good conscience,” counsel submitted that the defendants should not he made to pay the calls on these shares. Combating this argument Mr. Fitzherbert said that the defendants had refused to carry out their obligations. There was no reason why they should lie treated differently from other shareholders and exempted from signing the customary agreement In giving judgment for the plaintiff His Worship commented that the whole basis on which co-operative dairy companies would carry out t.ieir operations was that of assured supplies of milk. In the case in question, on the formation of the company, the shareholders had found it necessary to give an undertaking to supply all their milk to the Whakaronga factory. The defendants liad bought the shares of their own free will, and there was no reason why they should be placed on a different footing from other suppliers. They must meet the calls trade on account cf the shares they held.