On the Land

New Zealand Tablet, 2 November 1916, Page 59

On the Land

GENERAL. , The Queensland Department of Agriculture gives a simple method for trapping fruit flies, the bane of every orchardist. Get a number of pieces of board or tin, f and paint them with a luminous paixxt; then hang them in the fruit trees and cover them with some sticky mat-, ter such as . honey or treacle. ' The flies, moths, etc., will be attracted and will stick on the boards. When pretty well covered with insects they can be washed and used again. Experiments extending over several years indicate a probable profit from the application of a moderate top dressing of a nitrogenous fertiliser immediately - after the removal of the first crop. This should, of course, be made only on lands where the product is almost exclusively grasses. Top dressings with nitrate of soda for clover would be a mistake, as this, as is well known, should get its nitrogen from the aif. The quantity of fertiliser likely to prove useful will usually vary between about 150 to 2001bs per acre. Burnside Stock Report:—Fat Cattle.—lso yarded, the majority of which were of good quality. Competition was fairly keen at previous week’s rates. Best bullocks, to £23 17s 6d; medium do, £l6 to <£l7; inferior do, if 13 to if 14 10s; cows and heifer’s, medium, £ll to £l2 10s; inferior do, £9 to £lO 10s. Fat Sheep. —A medium yarding, 2072 being penned. The quality was fairly good, a few pens of extra prime being forward. Competition was keen throughout the sale, and a number of pens were secured by graziers. Extra prime wethers, 48s 6d to 525; good wethers, 36s to 395; medium do, 33s to 345; inferior do, 30s to 31s; prime ewes, to 40s £d; medium do, 30s to 335; inferior do, 24s to 265. Fat Lambs.—Sixty-four penned, the quality being good. Prices, on account of the large yarding at this season of the year, were much easier. Best lambs, 265; medium do, 19s to 225; inferior do, 17s to 19s. Pigs-—A small yarding of fat pigs came to hand, and for these late high rates were well maintained. Prime bacoxxers, to £5 ss; good, to £4 15s; medium, to £4 ss; best porkers, to £3 7s 6d ; medium, to £2 15s. There was a full yarding of stores, but the keen competition ktTpt values equal to those ruling at previous sale. At the Addington stock market last week there were average yardings of stock. Fat cattle sold at late rates. Store sheep were in keen demand at high prices. Fat lambs sold well, although the entry was the largest this season; and fat sheep sold at about previous week’s rates. Fat pigs again sold well, jiorkers being very scarce, but small stores were rather easier. Fat Lambs. —Best, 27s to 31s; others, 21s 6d to 26s 6d. Fat Sheep. Prime woolly wethers, 31s to 44s 6d; woolly merino wethers, 20s 9d to 26s 6d; woolly hoggets, 29s 9d to 44s 3d; extra prime shorn wethers, 435; prime shorn wethers,i2Bs to 32s 6d; others, 22s 6d to 27s 6d ; shorn merino wethers, 19s 6d to 225; prime woolly ewes, 31s to 395; others, 28s to 30s; prime shorn ewes, 27s 3d to 40s 6d; others, 19s 6d to 26s 6d. Fat Cattle.—Extra prime steers, £23 5s to £25; prime steers, £ls to £22 10s; ordinary steers, £9 15s .. to- £l4 10s; prime heifers, £ll to £l4 15s; ordinary heifers, £8 5s to £lO 15s; prime cows, £ll to £ls; ordinary cows, £9 2ao*6d to £lO. Pigs.— Choppers, £4 10s to £6 ; extra heavy baconers, to £5 ss; heavy bacoxxers, £4 15s to £5 4s; others, £3 15s to • £4 10sprice per lb, 7d to 7-ld; heavy porkers, 58s to 645; light porkers, 46s to 54s—price per lb, 9d to 9jd; large stores, 52s 6d; medium, 40s to 70s; smaller, 28s to 365; weaxxers,’ 18s to 275. FEEDING FARM HORSES. Experiments have been carried out in America with the object of ascertain the relative value of various rations for farm work horses in respect of the following points:—l. Maintenance of weight; 2. ■''Health, ' spirit, and ability of horses to endure hard work. The economy of each ration was also considered. The following were some of the conclusions reached : *

. 1. Clover hay is quite, as efficient as, if not a little superior to, timothy hay for horses at hard work, when a mixed ration of maize, oats, oil meal, and bran is fed. „ • ' - 2. Both kinds of hay had a similar effect on the spirit of the horses. Those receiving clover, however, had a glossier coat. - ‘ 3. When clover is used as a horse food the quality should be good, and a limited quantity should be fed. 4. Where lucerne hay is the fodder supplied to farm horses at hard work, less grain is necessary to prevent them from losing weight than when timothy hay is fed. 5. A saving of about 10 per cent, may be made by grinding the grain of farm horses when at hard, work. 6. Farm horses at hard work should receive 1 and l-sth to 1 and l-3rdlb of grain, and from 1 to Iflb of hay per 1001 b of live weight per day in order that their weight may be maintained. LAMBING EWES. When you see your ewes heavy in lamb, fat, but not too fat, stand about alone, appear stiff, lose the use of the hind legs, get down, and eventually die, you can take it for granted that they have succumbed to the disease known as Sarcospridosis. This trouble is due to a microscopic parasite in the blood cells, which exist, apart from sheep, on the lower leaves of herbage, such as grass or dandelion, in damp condition. It affects animals that are beginning to thrive as described above, and the preventive is constantly to change pasturage every lew days, keeping them off any one for a week, if possible. Bleeding at the eye vein is useful, and, if they are being led, half an ounce of sulphur a sheep in the feed will do good. For those affected try 10 drops of mix vomica three times a day. Ewes carrying twin lambs are vex-y frequently affected. ° LUCERNE FOR HORSES. According to information gained by the Kansas Agricultural College, and detailed in a bulletin on the there seems to be an almost universal opinion among horsemen, and especially among those who are raising heavy horses, that no grass or combination of grasses equals, or even approaches, the value of lucerne, alfalfa as it is called, as a pasture for horses. It is maintained that from an economical point of view it has no equal, as it will furnish so much more feed per acre than any other grass. It will not only pasture more horses, but it will produce horses of greater weight, larger bones, and stronger muscles. A horse that has been reared in an alfalfa pasture and fed a light ration of alfalfa pasture all the winter (says the bulletin), makes one of the finest horses to be found in any market to-day. To produce a horse of the highest 1 type, with the cleanest bone, the best-developed muscle, the best temperament, and the greatest action and finish, nitrogenous feed must be used, and in no other feed can this most essential element be found more cheaply than in lucerne. INTERCULTIVATION. In all districts subject to dry summers the question ol putting at least a portion of the arable land under intercultivated crops should receive attention (says a writer in the Journal of Agriculture). By shallow surface cultivation a mulch is kept upon the surface, and soils thus treated part with their'moisture far less rapidly than where intercultivation is neglected. One repeatedly sees abundant crops of kale, maize, etc., so treated standing alongside crops of the same kind grown in the same paddock but not intercultivated, and which in consequence had withered and died. A few acres so grown will often decide as to whether the stock c£lx be kept going till rains come, or must be sold at whatever they fetch. The cost of a little additional cultivation becomes a mattered very small import if it is the saving a loss of perhaps over 50 per cent, in the value of the stock.