324 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL gournaL. [1 Aprin, 1898. 
large a yicld as that of San Luis. A few months ago a storekeeper said he 
would give £8 per ton for onions. How is it that farmers who have land 
suitable for the production of onions do not go in more largely for their 
cultivation? There is money in it. -. 
ERADICATION OF NUT-GRASS. 
Tur Sugar Journal of 15th February republishes an article from the Clarence 
River Advocate on the destruction of nut-grass, which is worthy of general 
attention. Nut-grass is rampant on nearly all the scrub lands of the Albert, 
Logan, and other rivers of the Moreton district, and any proved method of 
destroying it should be hailed as a boon by the farmers whose lands are 
unfortunately infested by this pest. 
The article we refer to says:—At a meeting of the Hunter River Agricul 
tural Association some discussion took place (says. the Clarence River Advocate) 
on the eradication of this pest. Mr. Scobie said he had had 8 acres of vines very 
bad with it, and now scarcely a plant could be seen. Where it was in the open 
and could be got at, they simply ploughed the grounds in the winter, and as soon 
as any showed life they kept the scarifier at work with the knives 3 or 4 inches 
below the soil. If the ground got hard they gave it another ploughing. That was 
done for two years, and at the end of that time the greater portion of the nuts 
were dead. If any did appear, they got a careful man to go over the ground, 
and, if any appeared, to follow the plant down and dig the nut up. The land 
was thoroughly cleaned of the pest in two years. Mr. Bishop said he knew a 
gentleman who had a 5-acre paddock covered with nut-grass. He sowed it 
thickly with imphee, and killed every piece of it. The imphee smothered it; 
but it took five years to do so. 
POTATO-DRYING. 
Tue Puyallup Oitizen describes the method followed by Stevenson and Bar- 
tholomew, of Puyallup, Wash., in preparing evaporated potatoes for the Alaska 
trade, as follows :— ; 
The potatoes are placed in a sieve tank and thoroughly |washed with a 
hose. They are then placed in asteamer for cooking. When cooked they are 
carried to a corps of women who peel them. They are placed in a box and 
squeezed by a press through small holes in a steel plate upon sieves which fit 
like drawers in a kiln. Here they are dried until they are crisp and white. 
Then for the purpose of reducing the bulk they are ground into meal and 
sewed into canvas sacks, and are ready for the market. The onionsare peeled, 
sliced through a Pine root-cutter, and spread upon the sieves. When dry they 
are white as snow, and when cooked become as savoury asfresh onions. While 
the evaporating company have very successfully dried sweet corn, sweet 
potatoes, Hubbard squash, fruits, &c., they find that they have enough to do 
to supply the demand for potatoes and onions. 
The potatoes are packed in 25-lb. 8-oz. ducking sacks of the size of 50-1b. 
flour sacks. ‘The onions are packed in1, 2, 5, and 10 Ib. cans. : 
It takes three hours to dry onions or potatoes. It takes 7 1b. of green 
potatoes to make 1 1b. of dried potatoes, and 10 1b. of green onions to produce 
1 lb. of the preserved article. 
HOW SILOS OPERATE. 
Tux principle of the silo can be readily understood, if it is compared to an 
immense can of fruit, filled solidly full to the top and sealed securely with a 
heavy coat of mould like the old-fashioned mode of keeping preserves in 
open-top jars. The changes undergone by the food in a silo are caused by the 
useful bacteria absorbing oxygen and forming carbonic acid, the starch being 
rapidly converted into sugar. If the food in the silo has been properly 
tramped in and not too wet or not too dry, the temperature will rapidly rise to 
