Farming Notes.

Feilding Star, Volume XV, Issue 218, 19 January 1894, Page 2

Farming Notes.

(By Agricola). haymaking. As I stated in one of my last notes the farmers who cut their hay about Christmas and the New Tear are generally more fortunate in making good hay than those who cut earlier in the season. Such as been the case again this season. Numbers of farmers have been successful in saving their hay this season without a drop of rain on it. ENSILAGE. I notice that a few venturesome farmers have been experimenting by stocking their grass as it has been cut to make ensilege of it. One farmer in the Apiti district I notice put the grass in an ordinary stack without placing any weight on it, I don't know how it will turn out. Mr W. Mitchell of the Kiwitea I hear has put together a very large stack of green stuff, but has taken the precaution to put on weights as Mr Mills did last season, a reference to which I made sometime ago. LAMB SHEARING. Most of the farmers have taken advantage of the late dry weather to shear their lambs. The feed having been so abundant this season the lambs are shearing very well and are looking in tip top condition. I noticed a splendid flock of fat lambs on the road the other day coming from the celebrated Waituna district which were for the Wellington market. They were from Mr J. J. Williamson's estate. BUTTER. There is a saying " Going the whole hog or none." We carry it out to the letter in New Zealand. At one time we go mad on freezing companies, then farmers' alliance, now butter factories. In Taranaki they send away three hundred and six tons in four weeks. I don't see any record of what is sent away in Wellington, but there must be considerable quantities. Mr Corpe informs me that he received a cablegram from London lately stating that the market was overstocked and that prices were of a downward tendency. It was thought, however, that the rough weather they had experienced lately at Home would cause a scarcity of supplies and tend to cause a greater demand for the foreign importations. I notice a considerable gush over Mr Valentine, the lately appointed ex-" pert. " A new broom sweeps clean." It is to be hoped that he will sweep, or cause to be swept away, all so-called butter which is placed upon the market to the detriment of our country. It will be for the furthering of the interests of the farmers if direct communication can be opened up between New Zealand and other large towns at Home, such as Liverpool, Manchester, and Glasgow, as referred to by Mr Valentine. LAND SALES. I don't hear of many properties changing hands lately. The chronic complaint of money being scarce has something to do with it, no doubt. Mr Phillpotts, of the Wanganui Harbor Board Block, "has lately sold his neat farm to his neighbour, Mr W. W. Brown, for a good price. Mr Brown has been making additions to his estate in more ways than one, having lately returned from the "Auld Oountrie" with a bonnie bonnie lassy. We welcome them to our district and adopted country, and trust they will live long and be happy.