BUSH SICKNESS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 78, 19 August 1912, Page 4

BUSH SICKNESS.

The country on one side of Rotorua towards Tanranga suffers from a serious kind of pastoral epidemic. It attacks young stock as- wqlf as older stock, though in a different way. ft is equally deadly in its effect, on sheep. Horses alone are immune. For many years the districts affected have made little or no progress from a, pastoral point of view, thought sawmilling operations have been conducted with considerable'success. For some years tin; Department jiavp been investigating the disease and

experimenting. - It is reported that they have now .diagnosed the disease and discovered a -'icum".' In tho llou.se of Re-

presentatives the olher evening, ' Mr. Thompson,-in the course (f a speech that contained move information about this

country's latent wealth and possibilitiesthan, a hundred of the usual type of political speeches, touched upon this matter, die stated 'that the malady- was the^ result of a deficiency of iron i'n the blood of the icattle, and that where iron sulphate.-was- used on pastures the feed was better and the cattle healthy..- This discovery wilt nlean a great deal to the unfortunate people who have for years been holding, oni.to their sections in the hope of something .turning tho buyer that .never materialised—and will als« mean mireh-to-'the Dominion, as- it will bring into profitable Use fully a million acres. Settlement is going on apace in;the districts adjoining, the pumice, land responding well to "the treatment of fertilisers, and with the cattle disease eliminated from the million acres affected, the Rot.orua district that has always been : so heavily discounted for agricultural ; -or -pastoral purposes may before many years are over sustain a large and prosperous farming population.