GRAIN-GROWING INDUSTRY.

Waipa Post, Volume III, Issue 120, 18 June 1912, Page 4

GRAIN-GROWING INDUSTRY.

TROUBLE WITH THRESHING * MILLS.

Farmers are experiencing considerable trouble in consequence of the fewness of threshing machines operating, and the bad weather preventing mill-owners from getting the most out of their plants, says the Fcilding correspondent of the Manawatu Daily Times. The position, according to one farmer, is serious, and many farmers who increased their cropping areas have been hit heavily through being unable to get the benefit of their crops. Another trouble is that the mill operators have to be paid by the day instead of by the bushel, as formerly, and growing for seed has proved disastrous to all in consequence.

However, better provision is to be made for next year. A number of farmers throughout the district are combining and importing from Canada small threshing machines which can be operated successfully by means of a small oil engine, The heavy expense involved in employing labour under prevailing conditions is a set-back, and it is claimed that the introduction of small threshing machines will prove as important to the seed growing industry as the milking machines have been to dairying. The threshing-machine owners maintain that though they have been anxious to operate on the thousands of bushels of oats and barley waiting for them, the bad weather makes it impossible in many instances to get the plant across the paddocks. One millowner says that bad and careless stack building is mainly responsible for many of the farmers' big losses. Stack after stack has been found completely saturated and the grain spoiled.