CHAFF BY COURTESY.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9134, 6 July 1908, Page 4

CHAFF BY COURTESY.

Victoria has caused quite a stir in South Africa by prohibitng the importation of fodder from that country. Judging by revelations in the Melbourne "Argus," Victorian fodder is by no means above reproach. The tricks of the fodder "fakers" are many. Chaff is adulterated with salt to add to its weight. It is said that ten tons of salt were recently delivered at a chait'-cutting establishment. Mixing straw with hay, and cutting up the mixture and selling it as pure hay chaff, is said to be so common that when hay is scarce and prices high it is difficult to get the pure article. Oat husks and the refuse seeds from oatmeal and gristing establishments are bought by thousands of bags, and this rubbish, having little or no nutritive value, is mixed with oats, then crushed, ,and sold as "crushed oats." Instances are known in which oats cut and stacked for hay have been Threshed for oats on a rise in the price of grain, and the threshed straw then cut into chaff and sold, although containing little or no grain. Apparently there are farmers Careless o'.* dull enough to buy stuff like this. At some estab-

lishments machinery has been introduced for perfecting the mixing process, with the result that an attractive sample of chaff can be turned out which deceives all but skilled experts. * Adulteration sometimes takes very crude forms. A sample of chaff examined by the Department contained over 10 per/cent, of salt. The President of the Cab-drivers' Association says that one cabman was recently supplied with a bag of chaff mixed with straw and peb-

bles ; another had his supply weighted with cham'links, and a number ha 1 returned 28 tons of rubbish to a certain corn merchant, with whom they had refused to deal any more. Some had lost horses through deleterious matter in their feed. Asother buyer of chaff found in a sample purchased at £7 a ton coarse matter suitable for firewood, sam;, salt, ferns and bedding straw. Tlie

Government has put detectives on the track of the "fakers." As the Pu:e Foods Act applie3 only tD food for human beings, the charges against dealers will probably be attempting to obtain money by faise pretences.