1 Nov., 1898.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL: 345 
PREPARING THE LAND. 
In preparing the land for gardening, I should recommend deep working to 
begin with. Get down 15 or 18 inches with a subsoil plough if you can. The 
advantage of deep working will be chiefly apparent in a long spell of dry 
weather, when plants in deep soil will be found to grow and thrive, while 
others in shallow soils will require constant care and watering ta keep them alive. 
Having thoroughly broken up your land, the next step is to mark it off 
in sections for various kinds of vegetables, trees, &e. This will be largely a 
matter of convenience and circumstances, as no hard-and-fast rule can be laid 
down, but always bear in mind that even in a small garden horse labour is 
cheaper than hand labour; therefore, arrange things in such a manner that as 
much of the work as possible may be done by means of horses. 
In this connection, I would say, never sow garden crops of any kind 
broadcast. This is an obsolete custom which should have been done away with 
long ago. 
Always sow or plant in rows, and have the rows far enough apart to 
enable you to use either horse or hand cultivators between them. By following 
this system it is easy to keep the ground clean, and also to keep it open, and 
conserve the moisture by cultivation—a thing which cannot be done where 
crops are sown broadcast. 
This broadcasting of garden crops cannot be too strongly condemned ; as 
it is wasteful, untidy, and improfitable, except to the seed-sellers, who are the 
only people benefiting much by it. 
DROUGHTS, INSECT PESTS, AND THEIR USES. 
HowEveER much we may deplore the losses sustained by farmers, stock-owners, 
and fruit-growers, due to long-continued droughts, to floods, and to the 
thousand-and-one insect pests, which the Department of Agriculture is putting 
forth all its strength to, if not eradicate, at all events to minimise in their 
effects, yet there is much reason in the argument put forth by a writer in Farm 
and Dairy, that these things are really blessings in disguise. We agree to a 
great extent with his argument, because we have had practical experience of the 
results of many floods and droughts in this colony, and in the increased value 
of farm produce in consequence of these disasters. On one memorable 
oceasion in the sixties, when thousands of acres of crops were from 6 feet to 
90 feet under water, ruin appeared imminent, but the flood came after the 
potato crop was ready to take up. Hence many of the farmers had a goodly 
store of potatoes safely stored on dry land. These lucky men sold. their crop 
at the rate of £80 per ton, the average price, at that date, of potatoes 
being from £8 to £10 per ton. There was at the time a very large 
area (considering the number of farms) under this particular crop, and, 
had no flood occurred, the price would probably have fallen to £5 or 
£6 per ton. One acre saved was, therefore, equal to five acres. A 
farmer with six acres, four of which were not yet dug, realised at 4 tons per 
acre—the usual crop in new-serub land, on the coast—6240, whereas had no. 
flood happened the whole six acres would probably have yielded only £142, 
whilst extra labour in digging, bagging, and marketing 16 tons would have 
been required. A farmer at Gatton last season realised, we are informed, 
£400 from ten acres of potatoes. If floods had submerged one half of the 
farmers’ crops all over the Moreton and other districts, that crop being clear 
of flood might have brought in £600 or £700. The article we refer to reads 
thus:—‘‘ Viewed from a certain standpoint droughts are biessings in disguise, 
expecially to those who are not smitten by them. So also are San José Scale, 
fruit fly, scab, and all such pests. But the man on the land doesn’t generally 
view them in that light. Had there been no droughts in France, Spain, India, 
and Russia last year, New South Wales wheat-growers would never have got 
over 43, for their wheat, Wipe out droughts and pestilence and disease, and 
