no NE W SO UTH WALES. 



producing 1 acre, £7 12s., exclusive of rent and interest on capital. 

 Average return, 15 tons at, say, 16s. per ton, £12. Sugar-beet makes 

 a good rotation crop witli cereals and lucerne, clover, or grasses, whilst 

 tlie refus!-> pnlp makes excellent stock-food, especially if mixed with 

 chaff. 



Potatoes-. — Grown both as winter and summer cro]?.* Area in 1895, 

 30,089 acres, yielding an average of 2*83 tons per acre. Sometimes 

 15 tons are dug per acre. As a field crop, about 15 cwt. seed used 

 per acre, ploughed under every third furrow ; kainit, superphosphate, 

 and bone-dust mixed, largely used as a manure ; 1 to 2 cwt. per acre. 

 Cost to grow, £5 to £G per acre ; average return, £10 9s. per acre. 



Turnips. — Commonly grown in winter; \ to lib seed used per acre, 

 drilled in with manure. Yield, up to oO tons per acre. 



Mangold.— A valuable heavy yielding crop, coming in when turnijjs 

 are nearly done. Cultivation of this and the preceding root is greatly 

 neglected ; they should be extensively grown in a rotation as stock 

 food. 



Various CrojJS. — Onions, Arrowroot (Canna edulis). Chicory (average 

 yield, 40 j cwt. dried root per acre). Carrots (a useful field crop, good 

 horse-food) are also grown, but to a very limited extent. 



Leguminous Crojis. 



Lucerne (Medicago sativa), perhaps our best fodder plant, does 

 remarkably well wherever the natural rainfall is sufiicient or irrigation 

 can be applied ; keeps green and luxuriant during hottest months of 

 summer if roots are Avithin reach of moisture ; stands drought well if soil 

 is deep ; frequently yields 7 or 8 tons per acre, and as many as eight 

 cuts in the year, and it will last twelve or fifteen years. By means of 

 a box apparatus fitted on a wheelbarrow, 35 acres have been sown by 

 one man in a day. Broadcasting is better than drilling, using about 

 12 tb. seed per acre. It should not be fed down close the first season, 

 and the best results are undoubtedly obtained by cutting, and carting- 

 it to the animals. Dodder, its chief enemy, is readily kept in check 

 by timely eradication. Every stock-owner in the country should grow 

 it ; and as a paddock runs out it could be put under rotation (legumes 

 improve the ground much more than other plants if ploughed under) 

 and another jDaddock laid down. Bed Clover and Tares are grown 

 (largely with rye-grass) for dairy food ; and to assist the former in 

 setting its seed humble-bees have been introduced from New Zealand. 

 Lentils, Field-peas, Beans, and other pulse crops should be extensively 

 grown for stock food. Our leguminous crop plants, and many wild 

 forms, possess root nodules, indicative of the presence of soil bacteria, 

 now known to extract nitrogen (the most expensive of manures) from 

 the air and store it in such a way as renders it available for the host- 

 plant. 



Sugar-cane. — Productive area in 1895, ll,201 acres, confined to north- 

 east portion of the Colony. Average production, 18'G tons cane per 

 acre ; five years ago it Avas 21' tons. The decrease is largely due to the 

 prevalence of disease, believed to have been induced by constant crop- 



* The seasons run, roughly— sprini/r, September, October ; summer, November to March ; winter, June 

 July, August. 



