RURAL TOPICS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 2054, 4 December 1907, Page 5 (Supplement)

RURAL TOPICS.

It is reported that very few Manawatu properties are changing hands just at present. Dairy farms are seldom, and only at intervals, asked for, as the chief business done jin this direction is just before the season commences. Sheep country or fattening farms, however, continue to change hands, though the demand is only of an ordinary nature. Speaking at Wanganui recently Mr I. Hopkins, Government Apiarist, said he hoped Education Boards would consider the advisability of including bee culture in the elementary agricultural work of rural schools. He contended that the teaching of elementary agriculture would not be complete Without imparting information on hees in relation to agriculture and horticulture, a'tactical bee .culture should also be s taught,. and for this purpose a small apiary should be set up in a convenient centre, where deiinonstrations on handling bees, etc., could be given ' occasionally by experts for tlie benefit ‘ of both" teachers and pupils. Without something of •this kind verylittle good would result from addresses on_ihp subject. Nothing was so successful as practical demonstration in arousing an interest in young people. Mr Hopkins declared that the Dominion was one of the finest countries in the world for bee-keep-ilig. He estimated that 900 tons of honey and over 25 tons of beeswax •were produced in New Zealand last season, wort'll nearly £40,000, and lie believed that in tlie course of a few seasons the value of the annual output would reach £IOO,OOO. He knew pf four persons who produced between them 07 tons of honey arid a large quantity of wax, of a valuo well on for £6,01)0. Mr Newton King lias informed the “Taranaki Herald” that fifteen years ago fifty tons of bonedust was considered a very large consignment to come into the district, but now much more .attention is paid to-the matter, and lie has imported as much as 500 tons of fertilisers in a single shipment. Altogether during the present season lie’ lias imported over 1000' tons of fertilisers, including bonedust, superphosphates, and basic slag, which is increasing in favor as

a top-dressing. Somo of these aro of colonial manufacture, hut most of them comie from England, India, ad Japan. There is most certainly a dairy typo of cow as well ns a beef type, film tapers from lior hindquarters to her head, as if a wedge were resting on its triangular side, nnd she also tapers from the rear to the front, as if the came wedge were turned over so that a Hat side wore next tlie ground. This wedgo-shapo is more pronounced in some cows than in others, but it is found in all good dairy cows. It is. the opposite of the block shape that is found in tho beef animal of high quality. The dairy typo of cow has a large udder.*, largo milk wells, and largo .milk veins. The thigh is inclined to be concave rather than convex, as ’s found in the good beef animal. The firsit essential in shearing is, of course, cleanliness (says “Rust’cus,” in tlie “Lyteitlton Times”). Farmers cannot afford to build aim keep a shed exclusively for shearing. It is not necessary for them to do so, provided they prepare it » n - porly for tho annual shearing. Woolsheds come in very handy as granaries and storehouses during most o’ the year, for tho actual shearing lasts for a day or two only. But after being so used sheds should bo very thoroughly cleaned out bote re commencing to take tlie fleeces off. Every nook and cranny should bo swept- as clean as possible, and, sl v ’Vo all, no chaff or grass seed slioull t o allowed to remain. Tho floor should bo washed down with water and a strong broom, and every precaution taken against allowing any foreign matter of any sort to get mixed i p with tho wool.