FARM AND DAIRY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 145, 6 November 1912, Page 7

FARM AND DAIRY.

■ iVii*' ) J ■'; ,'■■!>! iT.M-iM .'.I Writes out MaketaVa . At last, it may'be s&fd,' 1 fSAneii'irt' 'tfo* ,'haye an bpjjortuiiity 1 6f 'combining' for their comtiion good, for no- othercop' striiction caii. be 'put ' frrr ihe' idea 3 set. forth faulfarj-'jthe cooperative 1 'auctioneering "feefiig'"-orgft-iiiWed j\t r < . Buekeridge. The amount''necessary ' ' finance , the scheme is not .invpossiblfir if 'farmers will/lmt stick togetheii, ...Thpre . is, Unfortunately; _ a largd nuip)}p}\ ( of croakers who will' &bQflt,,,wiiat 'was trikl 2ft Years il^b^'4ii : d' prqdipt fail-' ure of the : present iiioyerh'eiit. forgetting : the fact thai; the experience "of: time find' • the benefits.' pi" ediipatioti liaye- 'helped to enlarge the Vie'tf/of riJ.'dfeafcottuiftber regarding what true' At tlie sarhetime I iiujst a'dmifcitlwti:tt)o; many ftnd"it' eaisief'to' ge ! t''i!njt:o' the irut left .hy /'th t c_(il(l,inan." When 'limo'con-' • "siders how "tlie" 'tramilton farnreiWi'hhve » benefited . fyy-, their concern' stra,ngc that" the . farmers iai : e so carqle?s''/or 1 . It id' to'-be hoped that .the prhicipais, in;;'the present movement will keep iip the en'crgetie, move, and 1 am.sure the consummation, of the idea will' be .brought' about. Other attempts at co-operation hayc been ; crippled on account of' the; smallness of working capital, but the new p'roposal ■of £250,000 should be .ample, and one?, going properly tlie farmers, will ttyen re-, cognise the benefit of. pulling together. A Wairarapa settler has disposed of •tlie whole of his lambs for'the-, coining season to a southern buyejr at 14s per head. ■ ' ; Mr. .Coleman Phillips, president.of the ■ Holstein-Fresian Association of. New Zealand, and t]ie father of the co-opera-tive system, pointed put .to the Manawatu Times representative , that there were in the Manawatu ,sho\v 92 entries of Holsteins, 64 Ayrshiresj 4.7' Jerseys, 43 Shorthorns and 39 Herefords, 'Tlie HOlsteins; which ne had ,the ; honor to introduce into the North Island in 1888, now took pride of place over all other breeds of cattle. It is quite possible that the next sensational achievement of the chemists will be the discovery.that.soil radium is an important factor in determining fertility. At any rate, they are now working on the problem of the radio-activity of the soil in relation to chemical composition. Mr. R. B. Moore, of the Bureau of Soils, of the United States Department of Agriculture, gave the section on agricultural chemistry mi ac-' count of an experimental investigation of this sort recently conducted by his bureau. Soils were found.'to' vary widely in radio-activity; and then? seemed to be little relation between chemical constitution and radiant action. In the case of silica, however, it was found that in four cases where the sub-soils were more active than the soils, the amount of silica present in the soils greatly exceeded that in the subsoils.