232 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Mar., 1898. 
was promptly responded to, with the result that recently a struggle has 
set in, and the friends of the speculators were sanguine that sellers 
would not be able to hold out. The happy idea hit upon then, however, 
by Mr. J. S. Mortimer, a leading farmer of this district, that each grower 
should agree to contribute 10 per cent. of his wheat for immediate shipment, 
has caught on like wildfire, and now from one end of the Valley to the other 
the response on the part of the farmers has been nothing short of enthusiastic. 
Letters from the agricultural societies at Tatura and Nathalia have already 
been received, announcing signed agreements by the farmers to such an extent 
that those two centres, together with Numurkah, are themselves already 
prepared with well on for 10,000 bags. Mr. Mortimer has proceeded to: 
Melbourne to arrange preliminaries, and he telegraphs :— 
“ First shipment will leave in about ten days; arrangements made through 
Goldsbrough, Mort, and Co.; freight, 17s. 6d. per ton, and all consignments 
fully insured; liberal cash advances made immediately upon consignment. 
Get as many. additional subscribers of 10 per cent. of their wheat ready for 
first shipment, and a second is arranged for in about a fortnight or three 
weeks atter the first.” 
Since the Tatura and Nathalia, letters came in, meetings at Cobram, 
Katamatite, Shepparton, and other centres have been held, at which lists are 
reported as being numerously signed, so that, when the movement spreads to 
other wheatgrowing areas throughout the colony, it is anticipated that a 
sufficient number of farmers will very soon be found to make up, on the 10 per 
cent. basis, the whole of the 100,000 bags surplus. 
IMPROVING THE MILK YIELD. 
A writer in the Southern Farmer says that his cow gives all the milk that is 
wanted in a family of eight, and that from it, after taking all. that is required 
for other purposes, 260 lb. of butter was made last year. This is in part his 
treatment of the cow :—“ If you desire. to get a large yield of milk, give your 
cows every day water slightly warmed and slightly salted, in which bran has 
been stirred at the rate of one quart to two gallons of water. You will find, 
if you have this daily practice, that your cow will give 25 per cent. more 
milk immediately under the effects of it, and she will become so attached to 
the diet as to refuse.to drink clear water unless very thirsty ; but this mess 
she will drink almost any time, and ask for more. The amount of this drink 
necessary is an ordinary pail at a time, morning, noon, and night.” 
FROZEN MILK. 
Ture latest use to which freezing has been applied, so far as food products are 
concerned, is the freezing of milk. It is sold in bricks of different sizes, and 
warranted to be pure and sweet. Belgium’s Government is to subsidise the 
industry to the tune of £10,000 a year, while in Copenhagen a company has 
been formed and arrangements have been completed for the regular export of 
frozen milk. The necessary plant has been erected, and contracts have been 
made already for the delivery of 110,000 lb. a week, which will be sent to all 
parts of the world in bricks or blocks like ice. 
Tur Danes and Swedes have opened up a new industry in the shape of 
exporting milk in a frozen state. The milk of a certain district is brought 
into a common centre, where it is pasteurised at a temperature of 167 degrees 
Fahr. It is then frozen at 14 degrees Fahr., and the blocks of frozen milk are 
placed in casks of double the capacity of the blocks. The vacant space is 
filled with milk which is kept cool by the slowly melting blocks, and which 
cannot be churned into butter by the violence of vibration during transport. 
Milk thus treated will keep for at least twenty days, a period quite long 
enough to ensure its arrival in England, France, or any other European 
