The Farmer.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XX, Issue 2029, 11 February 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

The Farmer.

lootid i‘- '• Mr. I*. ‘l. F Tim a f r, and ;■ i . ■ in..vcr a. 'I £ • -i h.'Vs. He 1 dim-'li Hm-s rwo wt I.hing Tib'' I •••..••is ■■ •■rh :.".d 1.--;>) sine ■ d’liU.iv. Iv'liu ■III m.-u 1 He 1 laig-“ !i"r-u had ..i.vays h.ca lame' .once he bought li'n.. 1 urtveit years ago. until he t.•>:k his sines off. Tin- ;'iiim:.l Has not gone lame since. He was driven on hard •but roads, and of course, on pavements in 80--,,u. Tiie horses travel better than before their “hoes were taken od. They .are u..t afraid oil slippery pavements, as they were with sin es on, and there is no trouble in getting round on any kind of going in the eitv. Mr. Falun drove to Shrewsbury, J.% miles from Mehien. after two days' ram in February, 1881), when it was so icy that a boy c-u-ld skate all the way, and had no trouble. The hoof is hard and broad, and the frog is full and plump, and on a level. They had driven two winters on ice and snow altogether better than when th-y were shod. Their feet arc better f,r all purposes, and they can trot finer, pull as much, and go more miles in the c *me time than they could when shod. An interesting experiment in co-oper-ative fanning is now being made on the Duke oi Portland's Gringly estate, where a farm of 4-Ti acres, together with all the •tcek, horses, and implemeins'upon it. with all the rights of the tenant, has been let to an of agricultural labourers. The farm is chietly arable, there being only 3'i acres of grass. The general terms upon which the farm has been let aro that a fixed rent is to be paid half-yearly, and rates and taxes, except the drainage rate and property tax, to be paid by the tenants. The tenant right has been valued by valuers mutually chosen, and 3 per cent is to bo charged on the amount, to be paid half-yearly with the rent. The horses, stock, and implements left tqsm the farm have also been valued by ri.e same valuers, and a similar per-c-n L.i.e charged ns on the tenant-right. THe tenant-right, the stock, and implements are at all times to be kept up after a style of good husbandry, and the Duke of Portland, his agent or servants are to have ovary facility shown them to see that the capital is being in no way deteriorated. The mi n are having a deed of partnership drawn up among them, which they stare shall be in force for seven years. By it each one of them receives a wage of £1 a month, no one to receive more than another. At the end of the year their accounts arc to be balanced, and after tho rent and interest due on the valuation have been paid, together with an interest of •> per cent, to any one of the men who may have put a little capital into the concern, the remainder is to be paid over towards reducing the amount of the valuation, wr. ch it is hoped in time to clear.

While expirtm,' nearly all kinds of firm produce, the Americans cannot, or do uo: grow s'llii -lent potatoes for their own Coii-Uii'.'pt 0:1. To send wheat, bacon or dairy produce to tli • s-mes. w.ei! 1 bo as bad as shipping oml to X, wcas’.ic ; end yctthereis imarki t in America forpotatocs and they are regularly sent, for six months iu the ye ir. from Ireland, England. Scotland and (lermanr. Last winter one iroaroer alone to.,k over sacks. Herman poram, s, on ..«mr of th.-lr mealy Mixed. It is it to the earner from Albany to New T.ns i i.jioiiat ion of potatoes ts a remit thing. In Scotland a peek of r a me' as they call it ■ 'mg about ] f s.ois for tl ! 1., or -- Id. a Oirrel. ill Xm.v York a peck • :, r !. :o.d K H.(., a birrel. Of o •■•an freie'-M and a - ■ i, the Xeiv York ii o.■ - n p.-n to Europe an i 11 _ . eip indites of ID; -Va as a ’.vh.j:: - ,■ euitrv, the . r says : -*• T'b.- *; p--.t.oii with. Ann-rioi and the deb. ..f va! ie< in the IhirojK‘.iti ei.ni * te.ii itige Lav., not cheek' I the progu-is <.i er. jro.’,g fon to vviucU blur „• 'ii i ■ tpiou ha; caused win at to recede is i;u’equate to pay for its produetion ■...mc-nsur.itidy remunerate the grower . Wo donot thinkso. Xumet'.us e >: ipliints have ar : »*-n within the lvs r two years, just as much In tlm as-.-em'oiies . t the •/■■in tovs as in the smaller i'.irnihulds, of tlm dicome-s of manu.ii lio .nr and co.-r of tr i.nsj.ort and ‘hennremuufr.it.ve >d j of.igrtcnhurrdpri.dime,but as at present -neh a suite of things cannot lie altered, the proprietor is obliged to accept the low prees ruling in the market. So. then, the same complaints that the wheat-growers from all parts of Europe and America heir of the unprofitable, sale of their produce resounds even in Russ. a, where ttiey complain of realising nothing ,u all, but, nevertheless, pursue just the same tins, as it were, ruinous agriculture. It is tints that this system of culture is the only mode practicable in the south of Russia, with its triennial rotation of crops as being the less costly to follow, and to modify which would entail an expenditure of capital which is not {tossessed and an object win eh is almost untln 'light of, wlut to produce instead of wheat { Thus it is, in short, that as they cannot do otherwise, they continue to cultivate the soil as hitherto, perhaps indi(Terentiy, but yet cheaply, and however unprofitable the culture of wheat may have appeared for the last couple of years, it is said that low prices will not always continue, and a good harvest will compensate for losses of several preceding seasons, and they prefer trusting to the providential fall of rain and the succession af line weather than modify a system of agriculture which stakes the fortune of the grower upon a single card, upon that of wheat. Here and theresomewealthyproprietorhas been known to change his mode of culture, who while growing wheat and beets, fattens his cattle and manures his land, but the number forms aueh a minority as hardly to be taken into account.