English Agricultural Items.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 453, 12 March 1890, Page 4

English Agricultural Items.

(From the “New Zealand Farmer.” News received up to the end of November informs ns of a remarkably mild season in England. One or two days, writes a correspondent, were indeed fine and sunny enough for early summer, and the whole week was marked by the abscence of rain_ The tinted foliage is now fast disappearing from the trees, bub the singing of the birds at this time of the year is something to remember. The ivy blossom, about the last of our native blooms to appear, has been rich and abundant, but the attention of the bees has been distracted by the lace flowering of other plants .which, in ordinary seasons, would by now Have been cut down by frost. The beehive is another witness to the lingering of autumn, -for the queen bee has been deceived into laying her eggs. Dairy cows, which it is ; the custom to turn into winter quarters at the beginning of November, are still lying out at nights, and appear to be contented with what grazing remains upon the pastures, supplemented by an armfhl of hay at milking time. The rain having kept away during the last fort night -field operations are again in full swing, and as mangel and potato lands are now clear, the open season will permit of their being dunged and ploughed up for wheat rather than lying fallow for spring corn. Oii south country farms the planting of cabbage and thousand-headed kale is still in progress, and sheep farmers are coming more and more to appreciate the value ot those forage crops, The young

crops of rye, vetches, and trifolium are J making rapid growth, and an abundant ( supply of early summer keep seems now to be assured. Wheat, though a strong braird, i is much infested with larks, who do consider- } able damage, the only check against which seems to be thick sowing. In the presence of drier weather the threshing machine has been busier, but in too many cases only very sorry stuff is the result, the quality of tho corn affording abundant evidence of the evil influence exerted by the unfavourable weather of July and August. The corn crops of last season appear to have been poor in all countries. The Deutsche Landicirlhschaftliche Zeit.untj reports that all crops in Germany, except potatoes, ate under average, and it adds that straw is now dearer than hay, commanding about 25 per cent, more money, an event of very rare occurrence in that country. Dairy Education. j The Home Counties Dairy School, which I commenced its operations at Heath-street, I Hampstead, promises to be a great success. The local committee has been much strengthened by the addition of the names of Viscount Hampden, Lord Vernon, Sir J. Whitaker Ellis, M P., Mr E. Brodie Hoare, M.P., Mr John Thornton, and Rev. S. B. Burnaby, vicar of Hampstead. The Express Dairy Company has undertaken to supply 1,000 quarts of new milk daily, the whole of this quantity being required to enable each pupil to make butter. Miss Gard, of Tre-'ithen, Rosslynhill, Hampstead, is hon. secretary to the Ladies’ Committee, and will have supervision of the female pupils. It has been arranged that the public shall be admitted on payment of a small fee, and this opportunity to witness the best style of modern butter-making is one that cannot fail to be appreciated by dwellers in the metropolis. Ihe school is to remain open for three weeks, and there will be two complete courses of instruction occupying ten clays each. Dairy farming is making considerable progress in the prairie Province of Manitoba, and the first session of the Manitoba Dairymen’s Association was brought to a successful termination at the end . of October. The dairy industry has been in a flourishing state during the past season, one factory alone having turned out upwards of 50,0001 b. of butter.