236 president's address — section g (ii.). 



water to form a small private irrigation scheme indicates the immense 

 possibilities in this direction. The most practical way to promote 

 closer settlement is by establishing irrigation colonies for dairy-farming. 

 Forty acres of land under lucerne and maize on the banks of the Murray 

 would thus easily keep a family in affluence. 



2. Improvement in Dry-farming Methods. — The best way to carry 

 out the fallowing, and the right amount of superphosphate to use, are 

 points about which we are obtaining more information from year to 

 year. At the same time, the question of the most suitable variety of 

 wheat and the growth of green fodder crops for sheep is engaging the 

 attention of all progressive men. More importance needs to be at- 

 tached to the growth of deep-rooted and leguminous plants, and to the 

 rotation of crops. It is here that sheep worked in with the wheat is a 

 financial success. Lucerne, rape, peas, clovers, oats, and barley are 

 types of the crops that wherever possible should be grown along with 

 wheat. They are not to be sold in the market, but to be fed to sheep 

 and cattle, and the profit will come from the formation of humus, and 

 the consequent steady increase in the fertility of the land. Lucerne 

 stands unrivalled as a summer crop, the others are brought to maturity 

 by the winter rains alone. Then, again, the sheep conduce to clean 

 farming, grazing off the early wheat, and prevent the wild oats from 

 seeding. The extension of lucerne and rape into the drier areas, and the 

 introduction of allied plants that can be grown with even less rainfall, 

 are two of our most pressing problems. The possibilities of the field 

 pea in this connection need emphasizing. 



3. Conservation of Fodder. — In all parts of Australia certain months 

 are marked by the luxuriance of the herbage, of which the live stock 

 are unable to consume more than a small fraction. The monsoon rains 

 cause a growth that appears almost incredible in the warmer parts of 

 the continent, while the spring growth is often of the same character in 

 the southern States. Here, again, we want labor to make it practicable, 

 but, given labor as efficient as that which raises our wheat crop, and 

 the possibilities in the direction of hay and silage are immense. The 

 surplus of a good season might then be carried forward to meet a time 

 of drought. 



4. Improvement of Poor Soils. — The use of superphosphates and 

 the adoption of some such system of rotation as oats, peas, rape, barley 

 or wheat, most of the produce to be fed to live stock on the farm, will 

 at once start a man on the up-grade. Grass land top-dressed with 

 superhposphate or bonedust will rapidly increase in stock-carrying 

 capacitv. 



CONCLUSION. 



But suppose the present bright prospects of profitable markets 

 disappear, then, with our small population, much of the existing 

 industrial buoyancy would disappear also. But the farm as a home 

 would still remain, and, compared with other avenues of employment, 

 it would offer the best field for well-directed energy. Under such con- 

 ditions there are additional reasons wh}^ the most progressive units 

 of our population should turn their attention to agriculture. There 



