Farm and Garden

King Country Chronicle, Volume IV, Issue 229, 29 January 1910, Page 3

Farm and Garden

THE COW'S EYE. Inflammation of the eyes may be due to cold draughts or the presence of a foreign body in the eye; but is sometimes contagiou-4 and spreads rapidly through a herd. The animals affected mope by themselves, avoid the light, tears run from the eye, and the membranes round the eye are very much inflamed and painful, while the pupil of the eye becomes a light-bluish colour, and sometimes ulcerates. In these cases the eyes should be washed twice a day with lukewarm water, and bathed with a solution of loz of boracic acid in half a pint of water. As it is probably spread by flies, a little castor oil or other agent may be painted round the eyes of healthy cows to keep them off. If only one case occurs in a herd, and it is apparently not contagious, careful search should be made for a foreign body, such as a grass seed, and the eye bathed with warm water. Cows which are badly affected should be kept in a paddock by themselves, as they are very likely to be injured by other cows.

RINGWORM IN CALVES,

Rinwgorm is a skin disease affecting cattle of all ages, but most commonly calves and yearlings, and especially those in poor condition. It is frequently found in calves which are poddied and kept confined in pens, and, as it is very contagious, it spreads rapidly from calf to calf. It usually appears as round, greyish-white patches, from which the hair falls off, and which are covered with a hard crust. These spread from the centre, and may join in growing to a diameter of 2in or more. It is due to a fungus which invades the roots of the hair, and causes them to fall out. It is easily cured by first washing the part with hot water in which a little washing soda is dissolved, and then putting on one of the following:—Lard or vaseline 5 parts, sulphur 1 part; lard or vaseline 5 parts, iodine 1 part; fish oil or linseed oil 5 parts, sulphur 1 part; tincture of iodine. At the same time, the pens and sheds should be limewasned. Calves kept in good condition, hygienic surroundings, and having a good run, are not likely to suffer from it.---Max Henry, M.R.C.V.S., in the Agricultural Gazette of N.S. W.

FERTILITY AND PLANT FOOD. To produce profitable crops and at the same time to maintain and even to increase the productive capacity of the soil may rightly be termed "good farming." Many farmers are able to do this, and the knowledge of how to do it has been largely acquired through years of experience, during which the characetr of the soil, its adapatbility for crops, and the methods of its management and manuring have been made the subjects of careful study, without, however, any definite and accurate knowledge concerning manures and their functions in relation to soils and crops. Soils vary greatly in their capabilities of supplying food to crops. Different ingredients are deficient in different soils. The way to learn what materials are proper in a given case is by observation and experiment. The rational method for determining what ingredients of plantfood a soil fails to furnish in abundance, and how these lacking materials can be most economically supplied, is to put the questions to the soil with different fertilising materials and get the reply in the crops produced. The chief use of fertilisers is to supply plantfood. It is good farming to make the most of the natural resources of the soil.