THE JOURNAL 



OF THE 



MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE 



Vol. XXIX. No. 6. 



SEPTEMBER. 1922. 



NOTES FOR THE MONTH. 



Nearly thirty years ago, when I-ord Burghclere was President 

 of the Board of Agriculture and Sir Thomas Elliott Permanent 



. 1. , Secretary, it was increasingly felt that the 

 The Ministry's ^ . \ • i r u 



Journal Department required some means oi reach- 



ing agriculturists in order to bring before 

 them Acts of Parhament and the Orders and Kegulations of the 

 Board as well as much information of interest and importance 

 which the Board received through official channels, but which it 

 had at that time no means of bringing to the notice of the public. 

 It was decided that the most suitable means would be the publi- 

 cation of an official quarterly Journal and this w^as finally sanc- 

 tioned. The first issue was pubhshed in September, 1894, and 

 the introductory notice in the first number stated that it was 

 proposed to give publicity through the medium of the Journal to 

 information of interest to agriculturists and that it should record 

 statistical and other intelligence which could not be reasonably 

 or conveniently inserted in the annual pubhcations of the Depart- 

 ment." The condition of agriculture within the Empire and in 

 foreign countries, the results of research at home and abroad, 

 innovations in systems of cultivation, improvements in marketing 

 and distributing produce, farm pests, agricultural statistics, dis- 

 eases of animals — all these and other matters were to be dealt with. 



It was soon felt that a quarterly Journal was unsuitable, as 

 much information which it was desired to issue could not be 

 delayed, and after April, 1897. monthly publication was adopted. 

 Since that date many changes have taken place in the Journal in 

 harmony with the extension in the duties and interests of the 

 Department ; agricultural education and research have gone for- 

 ward with a bound, and the influence of progress in this direction 

 is nowhere more noticeable than in the pages of the Journal; 

 plant diseases and insect pests were always a prominent feature, 

 though the early issues gave but scant attention either to horti- 

 culture or poultry, two branches of agriculture which now obtain 

 a fair share of the Hmited number of pages available. But 

 perhaps the greatest change which would be noticed if a recent 



(44721). P.l./n.3. 10,750. 22. M. & S. A 



