I have 50 acres of crop this year. I am a sheep farmer. I have 1,400 sheep, irrespective of lambs, 23 horses, and eight cattle. I will be fully stocked when the lambs come along. Railway freights are all right, but sometimes there is unnecessary delay in transporting the stock. We put them on the trucks here on Monday morning at nine o'clock and they are taken out of the trucks at 10 or 11 o'clock the next morning at Midland. The special stock train is made up at Narrogin. If the stock train were made up at Katanning, the stock would be saved some hours in the train. This is decidedly a stock district. People have been settled on land unsuitable for cereals and with areas too small for stock. Most of them are over-capitalised. I have not too much faith in dairying in this district. I feed cows for home purposed all the year round. They are not of specially good quality. There are picked spots here where fodder could be grown in the summer time. I have not had any experience of ensilage except that people in Northern Victoria, who went in for ensilage 16 years ago, were not growing it two years ago. It may be that they have since gone in for irrigation.

9757. By Mr. CLARKSON: Have you any suggestions as to what the State could legitimately do for the encouragement of land settlement and the farming industry?—I think people should be advised not to take anything under a workable area. In the past they have been allowed to take too small holdings. A man should have nothing under 1,000 acres or 2,000 acres of poor country. The Department should give a man advice as to areas and make it clear that wheat growing on grazing land will not pay. I have tried oats, rape, and turnips for sheep with a fair amount of success. With early rains it is all right. This year we had first rain on the 7th April. This year it was the 24th May. I hand-fed on oats this year and found it profitable. I gave the ewes all they would eat. They ate about 1½lbs. each per day. They will pick up on that. Last year I gave it in a long bag feeders. This year I bought a patent feeder; too big a flock of crowds round it and trample each other. I have not tried spreading it on hard places in the paddock. I do not as a rule feed them after they lamb. I have not found the ewes leaving their lambs to go to the feeder. Some ewes with lambs did not go to the troughs at all. I got 2s. 2d. this year for my Merino wool. I have had a lot of York and box poison to deal with. I find grubbing it and filling the holes the best method of dealing with it. It is quite safe to graze among big poison from the 1st May till the end of September. I grub it out in the winter time. The following year it is idle and the next summer I burn it. In the matter of schooling: At Barton the lady school teacher had to go away to school herself for a course of training; meanwhile, the school is unattended. I suggest that duly qualified teachers should be sent into country districts.

9758. By Mr. CLARKSON: Have you any suggestions to make for the betterment of the industry?—I think truthful advertisement would do a lot. Exaggerated advertisements in the past have hurt land settlement immensely, by scaring away practical men with money. Wild dogs are very bad north of Dumbleyung; increasing the bonus is the only way of dealing with this pest. The blowfly pest on sheep is increasing. The saturating of a freshly skinned carcase with a preparation of arsenic and soda gives good results. Generally practised this would be of immense benefit. It would be of advantage to roads boards if the Government would amend the Act so as to allow of the board being subsidised on loan rates. (The witness retired.)

SETH HARGRAVE, Orchardist and Agent, sworn and examined:

9759. To Mr. CLARKSON: I hold 108 acres, of which 37 is under orchard, principally apples of the best export varieties. The difficulty is not in growing fruit but in finding a profitable market. I have an evaporating plant, which has enabled me to deal with fruit which would otherwise have been lost. In the early part of the season we had great trouble in getting a market for fruit owing to the stoppage of export. The local markets were glutted. I purchased an evaporator at a cost of £70 8s. landed in Wagin. The evaporator will do all the work that the manufacturers, Messrs. Metters, of Perth, claim for it. At the same time, having to operate on the fruit on a small scale, I think if we got 1d. a lb. for fresh fruit, it would be better than the evaporating. My evaporator holds 50 trays, each carrying six lbs. of fruit. I have a peeler and coring machine. I can put through 450 apples per hour. The cost was £4 10s. If larger evaporators could be used in one or more centres where all the apples could be sent from surrounding districts, it would be much better than a number of small evaporators. I think there are sufficient apples grown in the Wagin district to warrant a larger plant and the granting of a subsidy by the Government. I have not yet placed any of my evaporated apples on the market, but they look even better than others I have seen from Tasmania. Rome Beauty and Dunn's Seedling have been best with us for evaporating. Pears require a different treatment, and I am not yet in a position to speak on that. The local storekeeper tells me his cheque for dried fruits amounts to £200 per annum, which would indicate a tidy sum throughout the State. This year I have put out close on 15 tons of fruit to cows. That was fruit which threatened to go off before I could treat it. My wife and myself and one boy can keep the plant going 18 hours per day. I think something should be done in the matter of cases. We get cases from Millars. They are not all of the standard size. The price has risen 2d. per case. All should be of a standard measure. I am afraid the use of second-hand cases, even if fumigated, would tend to spread the fruit fly. Railway freights are not unreasonable in respect of ordinary consignments. I do not think the minimum rate is too high. We can send a single case of fruit to Perth at 10d. by goods train. I send a single case to Kukerin at 9d. Stone fruits grow very well here. On a small scale we dried some apricots this year and they proved very good. Peaches and plums we have not dried. Mr. Masters out here produced seven tons of currants. He has nine acres planted, but I do not know how much is in bearing. They were quite equal to anything I have seen from Mildura. (The witness retired.)