British Scientist Comments On Soil Deficiencies

Chronicle (Levin), 27 September 1949, Page 4

British Scientist Comments On Soil Deficiencies

Though thev soil deficiency problems ih Britain and New Zealand were not identicai, "New Zealand research on the subject was still productive of much informatioh 'which was useful to British workers, said Dr. H." H. Greeh, of the veterinary laboratory of the British Ministry of Agriculture at Weybridge. In company wifch other British scientists Dr. Green visited Levin at the weekend in the. course of a tour " of the Dominion following their attendanee at the recent agricultural conference in Adelaide and Canberra. As an instance he mentioned that one form of copper deficiency in cattle in England was very similar to the "peat scours" experienced in New Zealand and investigated by Dr. Cunningham at the Wallaceville Animal Diseases Slation — and it was Dr. Cunningham's Work in the Dominion which drew attention to the problem in Britain. As in New Zealand copper deficiency was an important soil prob'em in Britain, but there were some interesdng differences. The Dominion had both simple and complicated copper deficiencies, the latter, which was, a deficiency of copper associated with an excess of molybdenum, being the • cause of peat scours. In Britain, however, live stock suffered from a puzzling form of indueed copper deficiency where normal levels of

copper m the pascure were associated with some unknown factor, not necessarily molybdenum. . A great deal of British research at the present time was directed toward 'the identification of that unknown factor. The importance of this problem was shown by the fact that, if remedial treatment was not given, the mortality among lambs in. some districts might be from 10 to more than 30 per cent. This disease, known as swayback, was widespread in England, Scotland and Wales. It developed in the lamb in the - last month of the gestation period, and could be prevented by supplying copper salts to the mother ewe. An extremely delicate ba?ance ' of trace elements was necessary in the soil if grazing animals were to be maintained in good health. It had been 'found that it was not only deficiencies that could cause trouble. In some cases — molybdenum for example — an excess of a trace element created a problem in some p^aces. An exeess of molybdenum could be rectified by giving the animals more copper, but scientists had not yet been able to figure out just .why this should be so.