388 Hilda Kincaid : 



1. The diminution in the number of native animals which 

 ■were left in the olden times to die on the land and render up 

 their phosphorus. 



2. The introduction of a vast number of animals — viz., sheep, 

 cattle, pigs, etc., which resemble the native animals of the olden 

 time in that they convert plant-phosphorus into bone phos- 

 phorus, but which differ in this, that they are not left to die 

 on the lajid, but to a large extent are exported, bones and all, 

 right out of the country, carrying a large quantity of our much 

 needed phosphorus. 



In the past year Victoria alone is estimated to have carried 

 some 12,500,000 sheep and lambs, besides cattle (23). If 

 these sheep died on the land they would be helping on 

 the cycle from deep to superficial phosphate. Of these 

 12,500,000 grazing, over three million are slaughtered, about 

 800,000 being exported, and the rest used for home consumption. 

 The phosphorus in the faeces represents nearly all that which 

 is returned to the land, only a small jjroportion of the sheep 

 carried dying on the land except in a season of drought. The 

 use of phosphatic manures has increased largely within the last 

 few years, with advanced scientific knowledge and improved 

 methods, but as yet it is largely the cultivated land which is 

 benefited, and comparatively little the grazing land. It is inte- 

 resting to get some approximate valuation of the phosphoric 

 acid represented by 3,309,865 sheep — the number slaughtered. 

 On an average the amount of phosphoric acid in the carcase of 

 one sheep would be roughly 2.5 to 3 lbs. This gives an approxi- 

 matie estimate of 3699 tons of phosphoric acid taken from the 

 grazing land by 3,309,865 sheep ; of which about 892 

 tons are entirely lost to the State by the export of 800,000 sheep. 

 A very considerable amount. The amount lost by beef is much 

 less than by mutton; about 279,710 oxen being slaughtered for 

 food per year, the average weight of a carcase being from 750^ 

 to 800 lbs., and amount H.^Po4 in the carcase about 2 per- 

 cent., giving a loss of 1872 tons, about, from the grazing land ; 

 the amount entirely lost from the State in this wa}^ being only 

 about 15 tons, since only 168,294 lbs. of beef are exported. 



The Victorian Year Book, 1908-9 (23), shows the grand total 

 number of pairs of frozen rabbits and hares exported oversea. 



