MIXED AGRICULTURE.

Mataura Ensign, Volume 7, Issue 356, 13 May 1884, Page 5

MIXED AGRICULTURE.

«*. Every season, and especially every unfavorable season, Tarings out in a stronger light the necessity of a system of mixed agriculture. It is . during times of depression that the foundation of the most substantial work is laid, and to this sententious, but not highly original remark, we may add that the present has more weight on men's minds than the experience of the past, or the possibilities of the future. At the conclusion of ■a. specially successful . harvest, and good prices ruling for grain, a farmer is strongly tempted to think that, after all; there is- nothing ;like grain-growing for making money rapidly. The return per acre from shee^p or cattle for a'year looks mean and insignificant in comparisonwith the results obtained from - a good crop of wheat, secured in prime order and sold, at a good price. .Such... things r as nor'-westers have been thbwiijp arM-tnjeVe are records of stagnant markets, dry springs and summers, followed lay wet harvests, but they may not come round again for two or three years, and at any rate it is worth while risking another throw. Farmers who reason in this wise and act upon the conclusion drawn, accumulate a lot of valuable experience in the course of time, but which is usually purchased at its full market value. At the present stage of agriculture in this country small farmers are beset' with more difficulties than those of larger means. Sheep farming and grain growing, if the holding is large, is a plain and judicious course to follow out, unless the land, or a portion of it, should be specially suitable for cattle ; but a small farmer needs a greater variety of products, and, as we pointed out last week, crops which admit of a profitable expenditure of a considerable amount of labor on a limited eit.ent of land are of especial value to him. ■ On a 1 small farm every bushel- and 1 every leaf of produce musfctie mftdesfche.;, most of, if the farmer is to be..a,,|prpspc r- ;- ous man.' Sheep and grain' alone" "will not serve the .purpose of a smairhqlder. He needs' a greater variety of sto ; elc : : and a greater variety 'of ' jprodiicc— ' Canterbury Times.' i. .: v .. ; . .; .•-. .;'.