xl BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



Five copies per year to each applicant are furnished free of 

 charge as formerly, but those desiring more than this number 

 may secure them at cost. 



The salary of the State Ornithologist was increased from 

 SI, 500 to $2,000. An amendment was made to the wet lands 

 reclamation act, so called, allowing owners to repurchase within 

 two years reclaimed land at the original price plus the cost of 

 reclamation plus interest at the rate of 4 per cent per annum. 

 Permission was given to sell in the bale hay produced on re- 

 claimed land. The powers of credit unions were extended so 

 as to permit the lending of money to be applied to the purchase 

 of farms and farm lands and to improvements thereof and 

 thereupon. These unions were further authorized to issue 

 nontaxable forty-year debenture bonds to an amount not ex- 

 ceeding 80 per cent of the total mortgage loans outstanding at 

 the date of issue. 



The following recommendations did not become law: a resolve 

 providing for an appropriation of S2,500 to be used for collect- 

 ing and distributing available facts relating to the agricultural 

 resources, advantages and opportunities of the Commonwealth; 

 a resolve providing an appropriation of S500 to be used in 

 purchasing and caring for agricultural books, photographs, 

 exhibits, specimens and the like for the library of the Board; 

 an act providing an increase from $2,000 to $3,000 in the 

 appropriation for the encouragement of agriculture by the 

 holding of special exhibitions; an act to further extend and 

 protect co-operative associations; and an act providing for a 

 division of the appropriation for lectures before the Board and 

 extra clerical assistance, so as to permit the payment for said 

 lectures from the appropriation for disseminating useful in- 

 formation in agriculture, and so as further to permit the pay- 

 ment of all clerical assistance in the office of the Board, with 

 the exception of the first clerk, from an appropriation of $5,000 

 for this purpose alone. While the last-named bill was not 

 passed, a special appropriation of $2,800 was added to that for 

 dissemination, so that the regular office force was maintained. 



In connection, herewith, it is recommended that such laws 

 enacted each year as relate to agriculture be published in the 

 annual report of the Board, and separately at the discretion of 

 the secretary. 



