AN UNPROFITABLE PURSUIT.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXII, Issue 8839, 15 June 1907, Page 4

AN UNPROFITABLE PURSUIT.

Does poultry farming pay? This i s a question one frequently hears 3 isked. Judging from the prices one | las to pay for eggs at the present h time one would without' hesitation | a bo inclined to answer the question | in the affirmative. But the results | Of the egg-li>y'n? competitions that | have been Held and arc being held g in the South Island soon dispel this j belief. These results show that poultry keeping is not a particularly profitable industry. The results of the two principal competitions, those at Lincoln College and Blenheim, come far short of expectations, and offer very little encouragement to most people of modest means to take up the poultry industry. The contributor of poultry notes to ■ Christohurch Press, reviewing the year's work at Lincoln, shows that the amount expended on the competition in feed, sundries, and salary | was £307, and the sum received for | eggs £268, leaving a debit balance | of about £44, which, deducted from the salary, £156, shows the profit or wages that would have accruod to the producer, supposing him to have been a private person, at something like £lll. But this calculation takes! no account of the capital value of I the poultry, the pens, and the land; ■« nor does it contemplate such ciroumstances as, for instance, that *» more than 600 fowls, the number • competing, would have to be kept, f to ensure a regular supply of layers, or that the returns would almost certainly be less from an average collection of hens than from MJO picked birds from the yards of the district. When proper allowance has been made for all contingencies, including the sale of birds"j>ast laying, the Press contributor concludes that

the poultry farmer might consider himself lucky if at the end of the t year he was out of debt, haying lived on nothing in the meantime. The Blenheim Association has also completed its year's returns, and the statement is but slightly more satisfactory. The year's expenditure was made up of feed £202, sun- J dries £24, and salaries £313, a total of £539, and the receipts consisted of £451. The loss is £BB, which, deducted from £313, Jleaves £225, out of which to pay for interest on the cost of property and birds, i wages, and profit. The profit on the sale of birds may be put down at is 6d per head, or £45, bringing the total receipts up to £265 ; but against this lias to be set the amount for interest or rent, which could hardly be less than £SO, and the cost of bringing 600 birdsjto laying point, at 2s 6d each, £75, the net balance to meet all other expenses being £l9. But, remarks the Marlborough express, as this result is based on the most favourable conditions throughout, with expert attention at full pay, pickod birds, a/id with no trouble in connection with breeding, it would be reasonable'to knock off from 30 per cent to 50 per cent ol the result. The probability is that a much greater reduction would have to be made. The demonstrations certainly go to show that in the matter of farming for eggs the poultry business is not sufficiently profitable to tempt people to embark in it, and unless better results could be obtained by the raising of fowls for the table, combined with egg production, there is not much hope : for the extension of the industry. It would seem that New Zealand must depend for her supply of eggs not on the high class fowls that are set to work at demonstrations of this sort, but on the homely, barn door hens, the keeping of which is quite a subsidiary branch of ordinary farming. It is probably only by economical utilisation of household scraps and secondary grains grown on the farm that oven the industrious bam door hen enables the thrifty farmer's wife to count it profitable to keep fowls. Wo certainly agree with our Blenheim contemporary that after a two I years' trial thes°- egg-laiyng contests i have offered no justicflation for the i conntinuanco of snbisdy by tho | ernment. . Any further experiments that are desirable can be conducted at the State farms, where careful records are no doubt kept of the producing oowers of the different varieties" of birds.—Tarauaki Daily News. LONDON'S SOLID ATMOSPHERE. , Sir Frederick Treves, the King s ; surgoon, in addressing an audience 'of the Coal Smoke Abatement Society at the Haymarket Theatre the * other day, made the astounding \ statements that the air of London m one of its cleanest parts contains six tons of smut to the square mile, and that the lungs of the Londoner are either thundercloud blue or coal black from the dirt absorbed in breathing. Many arguments and illustrations have been used to try and rouse Londoners from their apathetic disregard of the fact that the smoky atmosphere of London might be made almost as pure and bright as that of the?countryside if Lou- ( doners insisted on its being done. Sir Frederick Treves put the matter m a new light. First he showed that the atmosphere of Chelsea is as bad fcas that of Manchester. In Manchester a test proved that the air contained lKcwt of sulphuric acid and 13cwt of "smut to the square mile. In Chelsea a test showed that the amount of solid matter in the air .per square mile was six tons. Then Sir Frederick showed how this affects , the lungs of the people who breathe it. "The lung of the young child is a dainty pink," he said. "The lung of tho adult, especially if ho lives in a city, is inky bluo—thundercloud . *lue, marked by patches and stripes of black. This is due absolutely and entirly to dirt, and chiefly to soot. The soot blocks up the interstices of the lungs, ;.and chokes the bronchial glands, so that the bronchial gland of the town dweller has a coal black surface. It is packed solid with soot. I have seen lungs in London that have been absolutely black from the surface to their very depths. It may be said that we do not wear our lungs in a visible place, and that the colour can give offence to no one. Bat this change in the colour of the lungs very much lessens their power of resistance to disease." Speaking °of the disastrous effects of fog on tho lnngs, Sir Frederick said: "The London fog would not admit of killing people by hundreds. It kills them by thousands. The sun is the cheapest, simplest, most effective germ killer we know. Surely if any place on the earth needs a germ killer it is the crowded streets of London," ho added, urging tho need for less fog and more sunshine. "If no plant can live or flourish in London back garden, how can it be supposed that a human being can go through a Loudon winter unharmed?' 'he asked. '' The wretchedness of a London winter is that of being weeks and months withor.: light. It is not air we breathe, but something with a sediment in it, something you can lean up against, as I was told in Whitecliapel," he I said.