424 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 June, 1899. 
THE CULTIVATION OF BROOM CORN. 
By DANIEL JONES. 
Pracrican demonstrations in rural districts of suggestions leading to diversifi- 
cation of crops are more than ever needed at the present time. Especially is it 
the case in those districts where our farmers have for years engaged in the 
cultivation of such crops as maize, potatoes or cereals, and. where, by con- 
tinuous cropping or by the vicissitudes of climate, they find the financial 
ultimate anything but satisfactory. This phase of agronomic routine has 
latterly been very much impressed upon my mind during a recent visit to the 
Maranoa district, notably to the region contiguous to Roma, and more especially 
in the settlements of Wallumbilla and Pickagenny. ‘There I observed indi- 
cations of an opportunity lost by many of the farmers who were engaged in 
wheat-growing, and who, in succéssive seasons, have, by the incidence of drought, 
for the most part lost their entire wheatcrop. Werethe farmers fully seized of the 
advantages attendant on the cultivation of broom corn in those localities, a very 
decided amelioration of their prospects would have resulted had they, upon the 
first warning of disaster to a prospective wheat yield, given timely attention 
to the alternative crop immediately practicable which they would have found in 
broom corn. 
The few farmers in those districts who availed themselves of the advantage 
of the season on the failure of the wheat crop, and who, on the land sown with 
wheat that failed to mature owing to drought, sowed broom corn, were fortunate 
enough to harvest a crop that, to some minor extent, compensated them for the 
major loss of the staple product. ‘Thus were most farmers prepared, in such a 
contingency, to alternate these crops, the aggregate of our agrarian losses 
would be very much minimised, more especially in the wheat-producing regions 
of our Western country, where a crop such as broom corn, that is light in 
transit over the long rail journey to the coast, and which has a further special 
advantage to commend it—viz., its comparative drought-resisting qualities—is of 
especial value. These are all very important reasons why the farmers of 
Southern Queensland should give some attention to the cultivation of this 
product. 
Having been for some years past the largest producer in Queensland of 
this particular product, I wish not only to put forth as tersely as possible the 
practical experience gained by myself, but also much as seems to me useful and 
practical of the gleanings of other cultivators in older countries where this 
staple has been grown, not as with us chiefly as a catch or emergency crop, but 
as a part of a regular system of rotation. Hence, in the forthcoming articles, 
I propose, as leisure permits, to enter into a somewhat exhaustive dissertation 
anent this topic, embracing in its features what is to us most important—the 
commercial aspects of the trade, no less than the conditions incidental to its 
cultivation and preparation for market. 
In order to let the prospective grower become possessed. of the full facts 
relating to this subject, I propose in a future article to deal with the supply and 
demand, not only of our own colony, but also in the neighbouring colonies, 
where we must have an outlet in the very possible contingeney of our own 
supply overtaking the local demand. It must not be taken for granted by any 
means that there exists an unlimited local demand for the article ; still it must 
be carefully noted that hitherto the broom manufacturing factories in Brisbane 
have never been able to secure enough local broom corn to fill a tithe of their 
demands; but they have always had to import largely from America and New 
South Wales, sometimes at an extravagant cost embarrassing to the manufacturer 
and no less inimical to the interests of the trader and user of the articles. Tt 
will thus at the outset be well to understand that there is a limit to demand ; 
but prospective indications augur that some years must elapse before the local 
or Australian market is glutted, and growers may therefore take heart of grace 
at this juncture, 
