1 Ave., 1899.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 133 
112s., and 115s. per ewt. Coffee has been growing at the Kamerunga State 
Nursery, Cairns, almost since its establishment, and last year we sent to 
England 5 cwt. The coffee was submitted to experts, who pronounced fayour- 
ably upon its quality, but, unfortunately, owing to there then being a slump in 
coffee on the English market, our Cairns coffee only brought 48s. per ewt. I 
was advised, however, that the same coffee, some time previously, would have 
fetched 75s. per cwt. in the English market. It is probably well known that 
the credit of first growing coffee on a commercial seale is due to the district in 
which we are now holding our Conference. Many years ago a gentleman here 
went in for coffee to the extent of some 10 or 11 acres, and I remember once 
when visiting him that his complaint was labour. I think certainly that the 
question of labour enters largely into coffee. c 
Dr. Tromarrs: Of course labour is everything, but the question is whether 
the labour can or cannot be had, and T still maintain we can erow coffee 
without black labour. I said coffee is a poor man’s crop, and J still say so. It 
is a family culture, and 5 or 10 acres can be attended to by a single family, if it 
is not too small. Five acres of coffee are sufficient to make a settler indepen- 
dent. It is an intense culture, and will give £30, nay, £40 to £60, per acre. 
We want settlers, plenty of them, and small farmers. My own experience is 
that coffee-picking will never exceed 3d. per lb., with either white or coloured 
labour. I can afford to import boys from the south—from Sydney —and keep a 
schoolmaster for them, and the picking will not cost more than 3d, per lb. 
CANE GRUBS. 
Mr. Wau. Beate (Childers), in initiating the discussion on the subject of how 
to eradicate the cane grub, said: Grubs visited us lately in large numbers 
and we were informed by the Department of Agriculture, which gave us some 
information on the matter, that the best way to get at the evil was to catch 
the parent of the grub—namely, the beetle. Now this beetle is very readily 
attracted by lamps ; and if these lamps are placed in the middle of atub of water, 
the pests are easily caught. In that way we reduce the beetles. In our 
district, we have felled something like 80,000 acres of scrub land within the last 
10 or 12 years, and we are beginning now to get it under the plough. We find 
that by continual cultivation and disturbance of the soil the pest is also 
materially reduced, and its ravages are not so apparent now. ‘The members of 
our association pay 3d. per ton on the cane sent to the mill for the purposes of 
beetle eradication, and on the money received we claim Government subsidy. 
Altogether, last year we spent between £300 and £400 on the collection of 
beetles, and, besides this, all grubs seen are picked up in the furrow when 
ploughing is going on. I find that exposure to the air kills the grubs, and the 
more the soil is disturbed the less trouble they ultimately give. 
Mr. N. J. Mixketsen (Avondale) : Although I have not had much trouble 
with it myself, the grub is certainly a very serious evil, and, as a remedy, more 
attention should be given to the assistance rendered by our native birds—say the 
ibis and the crow. I remember last year, when we were ploughing out cane, 
seeing ibis picking up the grubs. Of course I am living near the sea-coast, 
where there are any amount of such birds, but in other districts, where they are 
searcer, steps should be taken for their protection. i 
Mr. W. Grinson (Bingera) : About 5 years ago we had a block of about 30 
acres of land on which the cane was utterly destroyed. That cane we ploughed. 
under, and during the operation two boys followed behind the plough picking 
up the grubs. Behind the boys again was a flock of about fifty ibis, which 
appeared regularly every day as soon as the plough started work, and. these 
birds were particularly useful in picking up the smaller grubs which the boys 
missed seeing. That piece of land was ploughed in this way on three different 
occasions. Afterwards cane was planted on it, which is still there, and so far 
we have had no trouble with grubs in that particular block. About 3 years 
ago we had another field in which the grubs were picked out by the birds. The 
