WILL SMALL FARMING PAY.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 160, 2 March 1871, Page 7

WILL SMALL FARMING PAY.

'•The "Wangauui Herald" writes: — We published a letter in our last issue which went to show that small farming would not pay. It is a truism that figures can be twisted to prove almost anything under the sun, but there is hardly one man out of twenty who could not detect the fallacies involved in our correspondent's letter. The small farmer who understands the subject in a practical sense, will answer the argument in his own way. The letter has proved to our complete satisfaction that small farming will pay. It does not follow as a necessity that a small farmer will adopt, the plan traced out for him. Our correspondent is eminently unpractical. Would, for instance, any fai'nv.'r who had only forty acres of land, crop it all in wheat and oats'? The first absurdity of which

"Small Farmer" is guilty, is in the excluding the farmer's own labour, and making him pay for everything ho requires dono. Undoubtedly tho first element in small farming is in the proprietor putting his own shoulder to the wheel. No advocate of small farms ever contemplated sush a system as the farmer standing aloof and paying for his work. If this would pay, then we should have every tradesman, and indeed every other man, a small farmer. Then ag.iin, to suppose that a small farmer must pay £4 an acre for forty acres, aud pay £200 for house, sheds, &0., is too highflown for the genuine small farmer. The calculation for house, sheds, &c, at such a rate implies that the farmer ought to be a lazy good for nothing fellow. Beside 3it is wrong to put interest of money against his profits. A small farmer of forty acres ought not to commence on such a scale with borrowed money, and if tho money is his own, whatever it produces above his working expenses, is his profit. The profits of any business are what it produces above the expenses incurred in carrying it on. To get out of another difficulty, " .Small Farmer supposes that the weeds of the second year will entail the same expense* as tha clearing of the fir.it year. It is a part of the farmer's duty, working wiMi his own hands, to krcep the weeds down. " Small Firmer " again supposc-3 that a small farmer would hive to hire bia horse, plough, h-irrow, &c. ! Thi3 is another gross absurdity. These necessities fo be a part of the smali farmer's stock iv trade. A small farm ought to be self-contained. We sum up all aud 3ay that a small farmer who

has to hire everything and pay for\everything done, while he remained idle, on forty acivs (which are the hypothesis of our correspondent) ought not to, and could not, succeed. Supposy we make v calculation. A sm.ill farmer buys forty acres of nncloared land at £1 per aero, and pays his money down, or obtains it on deferred payments, as he ought to obtain it. He cuts his timber, erects his vrhare, sheds, and so forth, himself, the fittings of which cost him s.iy .£3O ; his two horses, plough, harrow, &c, cost him £20 ; extra labour for clearing, £20 ; fencing, £20; seed, £11 ; reaping, -tea, £20; he thrashes by hand — denying himself the luxury of a machine, — assistant, £5 ; marketing, £5 ; loss on bags, £8. Now we have his expenses, with his own labour understood, and we put it to every practical man whether our calculation is not on the right basis. The total amount of hi.s outlay then after paying for his farm w £139. Now for his crop. He puts 15 acres in wheat, 15 in oats, the former yielding, according to " Small Farmer's estimate, £84 7««. 6d., and the latter £75, total £159 7s. 6d. Here, instead of a dead loss, we have a profit of 29 7s. 6d., and there are ten acres besides for potatoes and other crops, which, even at the surne rate as wheat and oats, would yield £52 2s. 6d. more, making a total profi b of £82 1 0s. This is in the first year. The second year he saves the expense of erecting houses, <fcc!.j £30 : horses, plough, &c, £20 ; cleaving, £20 ; adding to his iacoros of the first year, £70 ; giving an income of the ssconcl year of £152 10s; and this irrespective oi the increased value given to his farm by the improvprneu-'s he hsis made. We have not iho slightest, doubt but what n. North of Ireland fiirmer, or an Ayrshire farmer, would Pisily accomplish siu;S a res-tit. If the farmer be a benedict all the better : he might then rmtko his cows a profitable sourer; of incom-% iviCi be as h:ippy as :i kmjr. Omall f^vniswdonot generally indulge in "girls of the period," but if they do hippen to get ttken in, small farming would not pay, and wo question if auvtbing else would. We invite the attention of our agricultural readers to tins subiect.