AGRICULTURAL ITEMS

Waikato Times, Volume LVII, Issue 8019, 27 September 1906, Page 1

AGRICULTURAL ITEMS

A correspondent witeu from Ntrßpaeruru to the Hawkes 11 y fi«■ rn.' i :—•• fluWeather in/re has (>wn all that can be de--iir-ii for IPuibtPi.', which h a.-■ g. on apace. If ;!'.-■ fine svi-atht-r the percentage w,;l be ibe greatest the ai'tncc has had. Thu spring has come in with w rin sunny days, and this has induced a growth of grass which gives the .and a very bright uppe.uMt ee. Stock are looking remarkably iveil for t'-'O time <f year, testifying to the good wintering capicity of the land." 'J he position of the. of New -oath Waiesatthe present time in a gr-v* one (says the !'asiu:ul;s >' Chronicle utlili ins;.). Since the arrival of the uiagiifictat tain stvrms of last week, we are assurd of a good season, and from tbat point of view all is well. Hue from tt e p liticai aide all is very tar from well. Th i d.scussion in the House list week shows the kind of t'eeliug that exists towards the pastvrulists in certain quarters. They have nothing to hope for jfrcni the Labour members. A remarkable instance of the diili ulty of conducting farming operations un ier the direction of a Crown Hanger (writes tDe Advocate) was given at the Colonial Conference. A settler was informed by the ranger that an orchard which he had planted would have to be uprooted and the land be put down in grass! This glaring instance of red-tape metoods did not convince delegates, however, that cropping restrictions should be removed, especially on some of the improved estates which have been settled—the detect was In the administration, not in the principle. Mr Phiilipps, Auckiaud President of the Farmers' Union, has given fr. m personal investigation an accouut of the .hardships suffered by settlers in the Thames Valley owing to mining tailings being deposited in the rivers of the district. He said the Waihi and other mining companies were putting into the Thames Valley watercourses forty thousand tons of tailings a month. These were being deposited in the bed of the river, making it impossible for the river to be navigated for a stretch of seven miles which had formerly been worked by steamers. If the depositing of the tailings of the river was not SiOpped, and a flood took place, millions of acres of land would be affected. The pinus insignia used to be spoken of with contempt as a timber tree, but recent experience has shown tbat it is by no means valueless when sawn up. fcome people, indeed, are willing to maintain that it is as good as any timber now available for rough sheds, stables, and the like, and the earlier plantations of insignis are being made use of for such purposes. Messrs Wigley and Thornly, for instance, have (says the Timaru Herald), just now a job on hand to cut 40,000 feet ot pinus insiguis timber from a belt of trees at Mr Pringle's hom-stead, above Wai-ti, and they are getting some good looking stuff out of it. One of their traction engines furnishes motive power, aod a saw-bench stands out in the open. Ihe timber now lying stacked near the bench shows that with this rough and ready sort of sawmill as good work can be done, in straight cutting, as iu a thousand horse-power mill. The trees are not very big, they are being sawn up us closely as possible, and there seems to be very little waste. The .Minuter for Works, New South Wales, is so impressed with the potentialities of the artesian supply in minimising the effects of diought in the northwestern portion of the St.'.te that he has determined to press forward with new works. By the end ot the present inoath t*entyrivQ bore tiust districts will have constituted under the Artbsian Weils Act, embracing 1,646,000 acres. Settlers in the western districts are meeting their statutory obligations satisfactorily. A farmer in the Winchester district, who has been using one of King's patent traps has caught nearly 400 bird 6 during the past fortnight. The largest Catch was 133. The majority of the captured biros were linnets, tor, although there are many times more sparrows than linnets on the farm, the former are too wary and sit alongside the trap just out of danger, while the leas cautious linnets are caught. Owing to the remarkably fine weather farm work of all kinds is far advanced in South Canterbury and nearly all grain crops have been sown. The early wheat crops are looking splendid, and, given a moderate rainfall, there should be some heavy crops. Lambing is now general and high preeentages are being obtained. Tne small birds se;.m more plentiful than ever, und this is due, no doubt, to the abundance of feed during the very mild winter. High lambing aveiages are the rule this season (says the Gore Staudard). Some preeentages are very high, 130 and 140 being by no means uncommon. A fe Aute settler was puzz.ud lately by uuaccouniable mortality amongst his sheep and cattle. Between forty and Jit'ty sheep (says the Hawkt's Bay Herald) died within a few days, as wed as seven head of cattle. The settler, at his wit's end to find the cause, called in the Government veterinary and stock inspector in charge of the district, Mr 1). H. Bait, who found the symptoms in ail cases to be those ot irritant poisoning. He forwarded portions of the dead bodies to the Government Analyst, who confirmed Mr Bait's su-picions, statiug positively that death was caused by arsenical poisoning. Inquiries elicited the fact that a quautty of weed destroyer had been used to kill blackberries a f6w days before the mortality commenced, and it is practically certain that the sheep and cattle partook of the grass around the bush on which the mixture had fallen and were poisoned thereby. 'J he settler had paid dearly for the knowledge he has acquired.