FARMING IN CANADA.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10107, 30 September 1910, Page 3

FARMING IN CANADA.

A "LEAN YEAR" EXPECTED

A London journalist who left England early this year, and has acquired a large area of land in the Canadian North-west, which he is farming with all the advantages that a judicious and considerable expenditure upon machinery can confer, writes as follows:—"I am afraid that this ia going to bs one of Canada's le:m years. It is marvellous what a difference three weeks can make, here. At the commencement of the month everybody was optimistic There had been plenty of rain in June and on July 3rd there was a heavy thunderstorm and the grain—practically everywhere—was looking in the pink of condition. Some of our neighbours, good farmsrs. were looking forward to record crops. But since then the conditions completely. For days together the ! thermometer has registered over 100 degrees in the shade,' J: there has been no m.nature, and ths ground and grain have been literally burnt. Men who have been expecting 25 and 30 bushels an acre will not get ten, others who should have had 40 will not get half that amount. But theae farmers are, comparatively speaking, well off, for hundreds have given up their crops as worthless and have ploughed the land up ready for next season. Just in this immediate district we are not quite so badly off, and I expect that the wheat will pan out at something approaching 20 bushela an acre. There may be a compensating advantage, too, in higher prices, a circumstance not likely to add to the satisfaction of those who have no grain to cut. "To farm successfully out here a man must have his wits about him. First and foremost he must know the best way of so dealing with the ground as to enable it to retain the maximum of moisture. Unless he ploughs, discs, harrows, and packs ■—and all at the proper season -he is pretty sure to suffer severely when a drought comes. Then he has to fight the weeds, A Frenchman close to us had lost all as the result of a mixture of drought and lambs'quarters, another neighbour is battling against stinkweed, we have ball mustard, fahe flax, wild oats, and blrfa bur to combat. All this means incessant cultivation of the soil. Another pest is the gopher. This little animal burrows in the ground and eats up the wheat—or fills his hole with it—as it ripens. The Government supply you with so many bottles of strychnine free for poisoning purposes and also make a reduoton in your taxes if you do this work properly—this is pretty emphatic testimony to the nuisance the gophers are. From March until November farming is very hard work, particularly iu those parts of Canada where the rainfall ia light. The presence of weeds, of course, indicates a productive soil, and if properly attended ■< to they can always be kept down. Still, they keep one pretty busy."