DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 218, 20 October 1909, Page 2

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE.

Tile seventeenth annual report of tb>j Department of Agriculture is only about half the size of the bulky volumes issued in thu past. Here ft is evident that economy has been practised, just us it has in other respects conueeted with the Department. During the year ended liltst October, 11)08, tile number of holdings over one acre in extent increased by 1785, and the area in occupotion by 040,071. The figures relating to the agricultural exports of the Domonion have already been given, In any case they relate only to the year ended 30th September, 1908, and are pretty stale information at this period. As to the iiax industry, it is stated that the greatest hope of a recovery from the existing condition of things seems to lie in tile cultivation of varieties which yield a better proportion of fibre, and m some cheaper methods of milling, in the section dealing with sheep, it is stated that there is great room for improvement in the standard of the ordinary ewe flocks of the Dominion. Reference is made to the success of the daily season, and to the fact that the lalue of the export of iiaiiy produce was 12,(100,-137, an increase of .1:242,323 upon the previous season's total. The industry of pork-breeding receives greater detention ill the Xorth Island than in the South. At the end of the year there were 2404 Augora goats ill New Zealand. She lloclts at the Government stations have made fair progress, and, generally, the goats have been increasingly availed of as destroyers of noxious bushes and weeds. The position as regards hors»breeding is said to be still unsatisfactory. Unsound horses continue to be bred from. In the districts where rabbits are regarded purely as it pest to i;e exterminated by all possible means, the numbers have been reduced, and the nuisance is well under control, hut m the localities where (rapping is still un-.-atisfaelory, and rabbits have, during the year, mysteriously appeared in localities where tliey had been previously unknown. The small birds pest continues to increase, and will do so until Systematic and universal efforts are made to cope with it. The poultry and bee-keeping industries are shown to have made progress, and the last fruit harvest is stated to have been generally good. |