556 
The Farm-Prize Competition, 1884. 
3 tons per acre — has an excellent effect. It is hauled from the 
kiln about two miles distant, where it costs 7s. to 85. a ton. No 
strict rotation is followed, and occasionally two corn crops are 
grown. The root crop of 1883 was good, and the land appeared 
fairly clean, considering seasons. At our second visit we found 
work much behind, owing to a severe attack of " pinkeye " in 
spring, and to extra roadwork in hauling materials for additional 
buildings which the landlord is erecting, and which, including a 
spacious covered yard, were much needed, and will add materially 
to the value of the farm. The success of the root crop would 
depend upon rainfall coming in time, but Mr. Acton was quite 
content with the weather, which suited his strong soils well. 
Here we saw the best field of winter beans in our travels, and as, 
at our first visit, we saw the pulse from a crop after barley stated 
to have yielded 7 quarters per acre ; it would appear that this 
land is suitable for this usually uncertain crop. Barley on wheat 
stubble, the latter manured for, was clean and promising ; the 
wheat was fair. This is essentially a stock farm, and the Here- 
ford cattle are doubtless well suited to a high, exposed country. 
The herd comprises Herefords, with three Shorthorns as nurse 
cows — a fact specially noted by one of the Judges, and which we 
found in other cases. The cows and heifers in-calf, 27 head, were 
useful and mostly well descended. " King Dick," a four-year- 
old of Messrs. Green's breeding, was in service. The general 
practice here and elsewhere is to calve the cows in the spring, 
the nearer grass time the better. Until calving the cows live 
cheaply, on straw and a few swedes ; and such are the feeding 
tendencies of the Herefords that they usually keep their flesh 
wonderfully. After the calf is born, and until the grass is ready, 
better food is given, and the cattle are turned out fresh into 
blooming pastures, where dam and produce have a fine time for 
the laying on of flesh. Gradually the cow dries as the calf 
ceases to require the milk. It is no wonder that, with such 
a system, the milking-powers of the cows are mediocre. The 
calves, always kept in fat condition, must lose their milking 
properties. We saw a capital lot of young animals, including 
7 two-year-old bullocks, 4 yearlings, 10 bullock calves of 1883, 
2 bull calves, and 11 heifer calves, all thriving and in first- 
rate condition. The bullocks were feeding in open yards, 
separated by a fence of rough rails secured to the posts by old 
horse-shoes. The elder lot were getting 100 lbs, daily of sliced 
roots, hay, and straw, and 10 lbs. of mixed cotton- and linseed- 
cake — costly food, — on which they were thriving. These animals 
had not been caked on grass. Rock-salt is liberally supplied. 
The calves of both sorts were a very smart lot ; they had been 
weaned when the cows came up from grass, and were getting 
