FARMING NEWS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 211, 6 August 1937, Page 5

FARMING NEWS.

RURAL RAKINGS. The introduction of the seed-fly to aid the campaign for the eradication o[ ragwort is proving satisfactory, according to Mr A A. Riggir, of Putaruru. Mr Rigger has had the seed-fly on his property for several months, and his investigations have shown that it is making inroads into the ragwort plants. Dr. D. Mnler, of the Cawthron Institute, visited Mr Rigger s farm recently, and expressed delight with the way in which the parasite had established itself. In all his experience, Dr. Miller said, he had never known such early results. , , , , Stressing the value of farmyard manure, Major-General Sir Robert MacCarrison in a lecture, recently, said : “Thus we find that foodstuffs grown on soil manured with farmyard manure were of higher nutritional quality than those grown on the same soil when manured with chemical manures. . . Impoverishment of the soil loads to a whole train of evils: pasture of poor quality; poor quality of stock raised upon it; poor quality of the foodstuffs they provido for man; poor quality of the vegetable foods that he cultivates for himself; and faulty nutrition with resultant disease in man and beast.” There has boon 'a strong inquiry for turnip food from up-country districts during the week (says a Southland paper). Iho shortage of turnip feed in some districts is now being felt more acutely, and in many cases sheep from outlying districts are beinn- driven long distances for feed, 'there '"have been some good crops of turnips and swedes in different parts of Southland, a great many of which, however, have been badly affected this season with rot, resulting ill a great loss in some of the crops. This trouble has been more apparent in swedes this year than for many years past, and is no doubt duo to the abnormally’wet autumn experienced. ' New Zealand shepherds have adopted many ingenious medicinal aids for ailing stock but few are claimed to be so efficacious among lambing ewes as the remedy prescribed by the manager of a large farm at Whitford, says the Auckland Herald. As the result of consistently cold and wet weather, many ewes are found in poor condition after lambing, and to restore them he has resorted to a drench of several leaspoonsful of whisky in milk.