294: QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Ocz., 1897. 
has set in and the leaves begin to turn yellow, throw the whole lot into a pit, 
and pour on it one kilogramme of hydrochloric acid and one kilogramme of 
sulphuric acid—both of which are quite inexpensive—diluted in, say, 5,000 or 
6,000 litres of water. Stir well three or four times a week. In about a 
month’s time the manure is ready for use. It is said to be very beneficial on 
meadows. 
Another process consists in preparing with it so-called nitrated super- 
phosphates. The plants are thrown into sulphuric acid at 60 degrees Beaumé. 
In less than a day they are dissolved by the acid; the resulting dark-brown 
liquid is then used to treat phosphates with, which are, under its action, trans- 
formed into superphosphates, with a slight proportion—about 2 per cent.—of 
nitrogen in them. . True, this is not much, but it is contended that the ordinary 
farmyard manure contains only } per cent. of nitrogen. 
Notwithstanding all the above various uses of the prickly pear, the writer . 
must confess he has great doubts as to its utility to us. He cannot help 
remarking that the nations which are said to thrive on it—the Sicilian and the 
Mexican—are amongst the poorest in the world. He is much afraid that our 
economic conditions and the price of labour in these colonies will be insuperable 
obstacles to its utilisation. He has no analyses at his command as to the 
feeding value of the plant, but from practical trials with cows and pigs he 
is inclined to put it very low indeed. The fruit has another disadvantage. 
It contains a most powerful red colouring dye which permeates the flesh, 
the bones, and the very marrow of animals fed on it—even poultry—thus 
depreciating their marketable value. 
A few squatters have already abandoned their holdings. Others have set 
to work and spent considerable sums of money in destroying it. Camps are 
being formed, the men receiving from 15s. to 20s. per week and found. Where 
timber is available, large heaps of it are made, The prickly pears are then dug 
out a couple of inches under ground with long-handled hoes or mattocks, 
wheeled on to the wood-heaps, and burnt. In other places large trenches are 
dug in the ground, and the plants are being buried in them. On the Experi- 
ment Farm we simply throw them into the holes of stumps and trees dug 
out for clearing the land, the cost of destroying them being thus reduced to a 
mere trifle. : 
The writer, it goes without saying, does not pretend to solve in a short 
article such a complicated question; but he begs leave to suggest the following 
simply as hints towards possible solutions and as a sort of basis for discussions 
and suggestions :— 
To test without delay the practicability or otherwise of. the above or any 
other means which might be suggested for utilising the plant. Should none— 
as he anticipates—turn out satisfactory, then steps should be taken at once to 
eradicate the pest by every possible means. 
In the meantime let all keep their places free from the pest, remembering 
that in this case the proverbial stitch in time would not save nine, but most 
likely 9,000,000. 
