The Chronicle. PUBLISHED DAILY LEVIN. THURSDAY, JANUARY 16, 1912. SALTED AND UNSALTED BUTTER.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 16 January 1913, Page 2

The Chronicle. PUBLISHED DAILY LEVIN. THURSDAY, JANUARY 16, 1912. SALTED AND UNSALTED BUTTER.

Daikykakmkus will have read witli special interest a cablegram from Melbourne, published this week, concerning unsalted butter and its keeping qualities. The information wms based upon a statement made to an august body—the Australasian Science Congress—by an expert attached to the Export Division of th« Victorian Agricultural Department. Thin deponent told the congress that a series of trials conducted by the department showed that unsaltod butter keeps better in cool storage over a lengthened period than salted. Of the total exported only 3o per cent, was unsalted, though it usually commands 2s per cwt. above salted in the English market. From inquiries made in Wellington by the New Zealand Times it is learned that the New Zealand experience has been that unsalted butter keeps equally as well in cool storage as that to which salt has been added. In fact it is the contention of some in the export trade that the former keeps 'better than the latter. This would bear out the contention advanced by .Mr Crowe (the expert alluded t< in the cablegram). But in reality salt is not added to butter to eniiance its keeping qualities in cool storage; it is done to suit the taste of the; customer. The great bulk of New Zealand butter is placed on the English market in a lightly salted condition -to suit the consumers re-

quirom.ents. .Such consignments r.s j aru sent away unsalted arc in fullilinuiiL of special orders which usually come from linns requiring butter lor blending purposes. It has always been found, however, that ii nsu 1 tod butter keeps very well, and is favourably reported on by the English authorities. From the meagre information contained in th: cablegram it is impossible ki draw any but general conclusions. Jt ; s not stated whether the butter used for the trials was made from cream taken from the same vat and churned in the same churn and sent tind.'i , exactly the .same conditions except for salting. AVith regard to the extra price made by the uns.alted article., it hiiis to ho remembered thai it would require the extra 2s per cwt., said to be paid, to make up for the extra weight of salt in the other, article. A greater quantity of butter-fat would'he required to make ci cwt. of butter, so that in all probability it is the maker's advantage to add the salt, quite, apart from the fact that the Home consumer prefers to have a percentage of salt in his butter.

AGRTCIJI/rUIIAL COLLEGES. Undoitutedly the ' farming community wil! receive a most helpful asset in the .agricultural colleges tliat tho Government proposes to establish at various centres in New Zealand. A lid as Now Zealand's prosperity is inseparable from that of the fanning community, it follows that the best interests of New Zealand will he promoted by. the proposed expenditures. These (we note from the letter of a 'Wellington correspondent) are to aggregate some £200,000. There will he one college for the North Island and one for the South (additional to the college, existing already «t Lincoln, Canterbury). - The North Island college is to be gone on with first. At'this point it is apropos to ask whether the pre-eminent claims of Woraroa Experiment Farm to he made the North Island college are being given the consideration they deserve. Will some Levin representative, civic, district, or •Parliamentary, enquire and make answer? There still is good time, for it "has been decided by the Government that before the matter is finally shaped a prominent number of the Government Party will visit the Hawkcstniw training farm in "Now South "Wales, on the

linos on which it is stated the Now Zealand institutions will he shaped. There 1 the college accommodates 200 resident pupils. It has largo farm buildings, lecture halls, class rooms, and laboratories I'or practical work in chemistry, physics, botany, entomology, bacteriology, .and nature study. The farm includes a thousand acres under cultivation, and there are separate departments dovoted to horticulture, poultry, fanning, stock, pigs, and other farm activities.