ANSWER TO CORRESPONDENT.

Otago Witness, Issue 2810, 22 January 1908, Page 8

ANSWER TO CORRESPONDENT.

A . Connor. -^-(l) As you say you are prepared to take a, low wage you ehould have no difficulty in getting the employment you wish. You would- do well to try to get on to a mixed farm where two or three teams are kept going, and in time you should prove yourself worthy of being put in charge of a team. : There is no better instructor you can get than the head jloughmanj and no better 'training for yourself than 'to become" thoroughly conversant With the management pi all the machinery Bn'the farm. But that will take two ■years-'-the first knocking about and taking part in ail the work with the stock x>n the farm nnd keeping your eyes open, and the second with the team. (2i The more knowledge you have of your imSfriess the lesa area you fequire to make a living on ; but locality must be considered. Two hundred acres on Hie Taieri Plain would be a heavy enough handling, properly worked, for any man. On top of Helen's Peak 2000 acres would not be much use to anyone. To show you ffirhai can be done^ by a man located i»ear

I a good market and thoroughly 1 trained I will, quote an instance recorded by the -Daily Record and Mail: — "A farm with an ' area of four acres — no more. It contains ! aix fields, two With green crops and the I other four given to oats, roots, barley, clover— one field to each. So much for the land. On this land as live stock the Danish peasant farmer^ keeps two oows, a horse, a sow, 200 fowls) four ducks. How much does he make out of it? What does lie sell? He makes on an average about £100 a year, or a little more, by the produce of his live stock. This is how ;t; t works out, roughly :•— Seven piga sold' for £20, two fat calves for £6, eggs for £46, fowls for £7, ducks for £4, milk for £31, 200 chickens for £7. - As to the harvest drawn by our model small holder from his six fields it may be figured thus: — 4-5 bushels of oats, 34 bushels of barley, 855 bushels of roots, 30 bushels of potatoes 1 . On four acres, then, in Denmark a man may support himself and family and make a liberal profit into the bargain." That ■could not be done here, and I could pick plenty of holes in that statement, but ;t serves to show the lines on which small holdings must be run, and suggests that six or eight weeks spent at the Milton poultry farm after your two years are up might be time well spent. (3) Dairy cows would exist on ensilage and straw, but not do well. AGRICOLA.