The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1940-06-27
cowboys "mustering" cattle.
Stock Runches of the Down Under
Continent Measured in Square Miles

transport, station homes have few
er amenities. There are no electric
lights, no refrigerators. Water in
canvas sacks is cooled by evapo-
ration on the shady verandas.
Yet life is pleasant, and afternoon
tea is an established custom. The
radio, magic destroyer of dis
tances, brings the worlds news and
music to the family living room.
Across the vast region, popularly
dubbed the "back of beyond" ether
waves crackle in the evening with
friendly chatter between neighbors
perhaps so or 100 miles apart, for
many stations are equipped with
hand-operated radio sending sets.
Out here the airplane has likewise
proved its worth, for flying doctors
now race hundreds of miles on their
errands of mercy. Now and then,
too, flying parson may drop in on
station to hold service.
Stock Routes Well Maintained.
The government maintains sys-
tenn of stock routes and tends them
with religious care, for they are
the arteries of far-reaching enter
prise. Across dry areas they wind
and twist to touch every available
spring, stream, and billabong.
Australia's land map is sketched
with a number of these long snaky
paths which radiate out to railways
and seaboard cities. One begins up
in the tablelands of Northern Terri
tory and reaches out to the railheads
| of Longreach, Winton and Charlie
vile to serve Townsville and Bris-
bane.
Another starts up in southwestern
Queensland, swerves through the
| northeastern corner of South Aus
tralia. and follows down the west
ern boundary of New South Wales
until it contacts the railway at Cock
burn, to find eventual outlet at Ade-
| laide.
A third trail connects the Kimber-
ley region of Western Australia with
| Wyndham, whose meatworks op-
crate during the winter months. In
Western Australia, too, another
seemingly endless meandering line
ties the railroads thrust out into the
interior with the expanses of North
ern Territory.
On these tenuous channels, hun
dreds of miles in length, you see
streams of steers moving out to-
ward the ports, eventually per-
haps to provide chilled beef for the
London market or bully beef for
British Tommies or jack-tars.
Unlike Argentina, where wild
herds once roamed and men needed
only to round them up, the Aus
tralian cattle industry has been built
up gradually from small beginnings
of half a century ago. Frozen
meat contracts have provided the
impetus.
In recent years, however, Aus
tralia has seen new handwriting
J on her economic wall. With i'm
proved refrigeration facilities and
fast ships, fresh chilled meat has
come to England from the Argen-
tine. Against it frozen meat cannot
compete.
Learning to Chill the Meat.
So the commonwealth has turned
to its scientists to learn whether it,
too, can deliver chilled beef to the
London market, a distance handi-
cap of $4,000 miles.
In the Brisbane abattoirs experts
have tackled the problem. With
test tubes and refrigeration cham
bers, and with bacterial, fungal and
yeast growths under their micro
scopes, they are learning the condi-
tions necessary for meat to main
tain its full freshness and color DUR
ing the month-and-a-half that it
must be on the high seas.
Romance is in their refrigerators,
which are controlled to fractions
of a degree, and their pipettes re-
fleet future profits, because these
quiet workers have been remark
ably successful in their expert
ments.
Several trial shiploads of meat,
sent in 1894, arrived in London
without deterioration. To this heart
ening assurance, the operators of
various meatworks quickly react
ed; plants are being altered to meet
the new requirements.
Less spectacular, perhaps, but
doubly more profitable than the
herds that roam the interior, is the
dairy stock pastured in the fertile
coastal belt, mainly in New South
Wales, Victoria, and Queensland.
Approximately sixth of the coun-
try's cattle are bred for their milk
/ products.