FARM, GARDEN, AND ORCHARD NOTES.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 2739, 1 February 1890, Page 6 (Supplement)

FARM, GARDEN, AND ORCHARD NOTES.

Yield of Cows.—A common estimate is 450 gallons, or 45001b. of milk per cow; and lib. of buttor to each 251b. of milk. But there are many records of a dairy of cows giving above 600 gallons per cow, with butter at the rate of lib. to each 151b. to 181b. of milk. The former is a low estimate, with which no man should be content, The latter is a very high one, which would require skill in selecting the cows and the very best of feeding to approach. Fattening Lambs.—The Agricultural Experiment Station of Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, has made a valuable experiment in fattening lambs. Twelve grade Shropshire aud Southdown lambs wero fed from November to April, The weight of evidence shows:—That corn, as an exclusive grain ration docs not give tho best results, either in amount, quality, or economy of production, when fed to growing or fattening animals. That the amount of water drunk, especially in the case of our lambs, is a pretty certain indication of the rate of gain. That the production of wool is greatly dependent upon the nitrogen in the ration. Enticuni; Bait for Rat Traps.—A discovery has been made by Captain Weedin, in charge of the animals at the "Zoo" at Washington. The building was infested with rats, and how to got rid of them had long been a perplexing question. Traps were used, but nothing would tempt the rodents to enter. In a store-room drawer was placed a quantity of sunflower seeds, used as food for some of tho birds. Into this drawer the rats gnawed their way—a fact which led the captain to experiment with them for bait in tho traps. The result was that the rats could not be kept out. A trap, which appeared crowded with 6or S rats, was found some mornings to hold 15. Rust and its Causes.—After a

thorough investigation as to the cause of rust in wheat aud other grains, the Guelph, Ontario, Agricultural College has arrived at the following conclusions :—I. Seasons are the chief cause of rust; sudden changes of tempeiature and rain, accompanied by close, still weather, are favourable to its increase. 2. Lowlyiug, rich soils are most subject to attack. 3. An excessive use of manures, rich in nitrogen, encourages the disease. 4. Late sown grain is most subject to attacks. 5. Thinly sown crops seem most liable to injury. 6. Red wheats are less affected than white varieties. 4. Rust is more common in the vicinity of barbery hedges than it is at a greater distance. Ramie Fibre, —The Ramie Company of America gave a public trial of a Ramie fibre decorticating machine and chemical process for fibreising, degumraing and bleaching ramie, at Bloomsdale Farm, recently. The trial was apparently successful. The cano was crushed and the wood separated from the bark by heavy ribbed rollers and then submitted to a chemical process by which the gum was extracted. The bleaching followed. The inventor, Monsieur Jules Juveuet, claims

that the machine and the prooess solve the problem of producing ramie bark fibre that will enable it to take a loading place among the textiles, for the solution of which the British a.id French

Governments offered prizes. Mr J, T. Sto wart, the secretary and treasurer of the company, said that the test had domonstrated that the machine would decorticate cheaply, and that they could degum and bleach ramie, and that they could consider themselves fairly successful after a six months' trial. Lokd Derby on Peasant Proprietors.—Lord Derby, speaking at Rochdale the other day, said they were bound to do what they oould to ronder the transfer of land easy, and so to increase productive power. The theory which was uppermost at present was what he might call the peasant proprietor theory—the ownership of land in small plots of individual cultivators. He greatly doubted whether without cx> ceptional sagacity or exceptional opportunities the owner of 10, 15, or even 20 acres will be able to hold his own against the competition of large capital and better appliances, and against the temptation of ready money if ho was pressed to sell. If he could hold his own his success was a gain in every way to the community j but in order to succeed he must keep his land free from encumbrances. If it was mortgaged to the greater part of its valuo, he would bo worse off than a tenant paying rent. But he believed the question was one that could be settled only by actual experiment—and on that

iicoount, as well as on various others, he should wish the experiment to have the fairest and most conclusive trial. New Method ov Ascertaininc; the Amount of Fat is Milk.—At the lowa Station; a new method of determining the amount of fat in milk has been devised. The principle upon which it is baaed is that the solids, other than the fat, are dissolved, and thus the fat is separated from the rest, and it rises to

the top of the tube, where it may be measured. The tube used is about 12 inches long, and about three-quarters of an inch iu diameter at the base, closed at one end and. made, smaller for »

few inches near the middle. The quautity of milk taken is 10.8 cubic centimetres. To this add 14 to 16 cubic centimeters of a mixture composed of strong acetic acid, about 9 parts ; oil ofvitrol, 5 parts ; and chlorohydric acid about 2 parts, all by volume. The proportions need not be very accurately measured, as it is not essential for the exactness of the result. After the contents have been completely mixed, the tube is then set on a sand bath (a small saucer of sand, and boiled quickly for ten minutes, and then slowly for ten more. The tube being then removed, it is allowed to cool, when the fat will collect in the narrow part. of the tube, where it may be read off with a special scale.

Demand fob Lustre Wools.—Some three or four years ago a number of ladies headed by the Countess of Bective, formed a project for benefiting British agriculturists by bringing fabrics made from British lustre wools into fashion. This met with but partial success at the time ; but it appears now to be bearing fruit, for a sudden demand has set in on the Bradford market for lustre fabrics, and staplers and manufacturers are at their wits'end to produce a sufficiency of lustre wools to meet it. For years past the production of wool has been a secondary consideration with the English sheep breeders. Shropshire, Cotswold, Southdown and various crosses have been fouud to be the best mutton producers, and the lustre wools have been neglected except in a few districts. The colonies do not produce the class of wools required for lustre fabrics, so that we cannot expect to profit by the sudden rise in that class of wool ; but on the other hand, any increase in the growth of lustre wool means a corresponding decrease in the growth of a description of wool which came largely into competition with our crossbred wool and to some extent also with our low class merinos. Pigs in Japax.— Thirty-one years ago the pig was unknown in Japan ; at present it is as common as rabbits in Australia or sparrows in tho United States. Sheep do not thrive, due to an undergrowth of young bamboo in the grass land, which produces fatal indigestions ; this makes Japan dependent on Australia for her wool supply, like France and England. Manure is not plentiful, but the farmer never omits to secure a commercial supply to cover tho elements of food carried off by the plant—even before he commenced to study agricultural chemistry. Farm labourers are paid 25 sous a day and women 17, in addition to food ; if engaged by the year, they will be supplied with shoes, two suits of clothe.", a pair of towels and a few other necessaries. Agricultural industry is confined to industrial plants, vegetables, rice, tea, silk culture and woods. Her display of the litter is unique, but her Forestry School is celebrated, and has been constituted after the best European models. Her progress in agricultural education is prodigious; hor chemists analyse soils, manures, plants, &c., free for farmers; her professors indicate and make collections for school use of the plants and insects hurtful to agriculture ; meteorology is carefully studied, and as an epitome of farming operations throughout the world, suitable to Japan, published for native application. Hampshire Sheep.— These are the largest iu size of any of the Down varieties, and it is tho boast of the breeders that thoy come to earlier maturity than | any other. They admirably suit tho large chalk farms of the South-Western counties that are possessed of artificial water-meadows, the latter, giving abundant food for the ewes and lambs in the critical month of April, when in other districts the farms are very barren after all the turnips have been consumed. The race originated by crossing the old Berkshire knot and the Wiltshire horn with the Southdown, by which means early iu the century a characteristic variety, with gaunt frames, coarse heads, and black faces, had been created, termed at first West Country Downs. When about 1845 the late Mr Humphrey set himself to improvo this race by the employment of some of the finest and thickest fleßhed of Jonas Webb's Southdown rams, the improved Hampshires came into existence, and have had truly marvellous development ever since. The extension of the breed has certainly not been so great as that of the Shropshire, from the fact probably of the latter being adapted to a more extended set of soils and circumstances. Hampshires are, however, more popular, not only in tho counties of Hants, Wilts, and Dorset, but further eastwards and northwards, as there is every reason why they should be, whenever tho conditions of early maturity can be suppliod. The British. Wheat Supply.—Esti-

mates of the wheat yield form interesting reading at this season of the year to a large number of our farmers ; but while the subject is important locally, we have still to remember that prices are ruled to a large extent by the yields obtained in other countries, and more especially by the wheat crop of Great Britain. There, as here, estimates of the probable yield are annually mado by Government, the leading agricultural journals, and othfars, but the most reliable authority of the whole in this respect of late years has been Sir J. 3. Lawes, who bases his calculations on results obtained from a few experimental plots at Rothamsted, which have grown wheat for 46 yoars. Sir John estimates that the yield of the country for this year is 27 A- bushels per acre, at tho standard weight of 6libs, per bushel. The area under the crop in the United Kingdom is returned at 2,510,720

acres, which is 122,716 acres less than in 1888. Taking the area of tha 1889 crop and a yield of 27i bushels per acre, the gross product will be about 8,733,725 quarters; and deducting tw® bushels per acre for seed on the same area, the home

produce available for consumption will amount to a little over 8,098,541 quarters. Taking the population for the current harvest year at rather over 38,140,830, the amount required for consumption at 0.65 bushels per head will be nearly 26,906,961 quarters ; and deducting from this the quantity available from the home

crop, there remains 15,835,416 quarters to be provided by stocks and imports. Thus, although there is a rather higher estimated yield per acre this year than last, yet with a reduced area under the crop, the homo produce yields rather less

For consumption this year; and with.

in addition, an increased population, it results that the requirements from other sources will, according to the figures, be rather higher than in the preceding harvest year.

Smut.—At seed time one hears a great deal about smut in wheat and other cereals, but very little as to the cause of

thia disease. A Californian farmer, who claims to have given the subject much thought extending over a period of 30 years advances the opinion that where seed wheat is cracked in thrashing there aro a great macy hearts of the grain exposed to the weather, and these grow nothing but smut, for tho reason that it is unnatural and there can be nothing perfect come from it. One thing which leads him to think that oraoked grain is the cause of smut is from a standpoint of comparison, Barley, ho observes, is cracked, but very little in the process of thrashing, and in barley there is but a small percentage of Bmut, while Volunteer wheat has seldom any smut. Another reason, ho contends, for believing that smut is confined to cracked grain is that

smut will not grow and is no disease. You may find a head of imufc with good wheat alj round it, but when you run out the wheat in your hand you will find that it is just as clean and pure as though there was no smut in tho field ; but when you come to thrash the grain all together you will fiad that the powder from the smutted grains has settled on the clean grain, lodging mostly in the fuzy and small end of tho grain. But somo will ask, M \yhy aro oats and some kinds of grass affected with smut V Our Califqrnian authority answers this question by saying that when the first vain comes iu the auti)mu it seldom raius enough to

cause oats to grow, but swells them, Then wind and sHnshitie cause the hall to crack, and the heart of tho oat is, as the heart of the cracked wheat, exposed to the weather. It would bo interesting to know to what extent Australian experience agrees with these conclusions.

Fast Walkers on tub Farm.—Some very apposito remarks on the walking puce of farm horses were made the other day by an agricultural writer in a New Orleans newspaper. He says:—"lu purchasing or hiring a plough horse stake off a mile of road. Mount the horse and see how long it will take bim to walk a mile. A horse that will walk three milas an hour is worth at least three timos as much as a horse that walks but two miles. The three-mile horse not only does as much work in two days as the two-milo horse does in three, but ho enables the man behind tho plough to do .50 per cent, more work in a day than he can do behind the two-mile horse. And the man and the horse consume with the slow team 60 per cent, more rations in doing tho same work that the fast walker does. In twelve months the man would do no more carting and ploughing with tho slow horso than he would do in eight with the fast walker. Suppose a farmer to hire a man and a two-mile horse to do an amount of ploughing and carting that it takes three months to perform, and pays 3 dols. a month for the horse, 3 dols. for his feed, and 18 dols. for the man (who boards himself) ; 24 dols. a month—three months, 72 dollars. If he hires the same man at 15 dols., and pays 3 dols. for horse feed and i dols. for a fast walker, ho can do in two months what the slow team would do in three. Two months, fast team and feed and ploughman, at 25 dols. a month, 50 dols. Direct loss by slow horse, 22 dols. Besides, the work done by tho clow horse is not so well or seasonably done—the seed may be put in the ground too late, the grass may get ahead of the plough, and the indirect loss of the slow team may be serious—besides the 22 dols, loss, as stated above.