Thursday, __March 77, 71968

Walter R. Shaw: Did you notice that windows have been opened on that side?

Hon. Daniel J. MacDonald: Open wider over there!

Mr. Speaker, my report with the Department continues as I left off this after- noon. The cattle business remains stable in 1967 with prices of cattle similar to 1966. Auction sales established on a regular basis at Charlottetown. Lot 16, and O’Leary have had a good influence on the cattle business and has certainly given farmers more bargaining power in the sales of their cattle.

Marketing of sheep and lambs to inspected plants again showed a decline.

Hog marketing showed a significent increase. During the year 1967, a total of 17,670 cattle, 1,985 calves and 136,000 hogs, this is an increase over last year of 23,000 hogs. They were all marketed through killing plants.

The percentage of Grade “A” hogs shipped from Island farms was 55.6% compared with 55.7 in 1966. Over 280 bonuses were paid on the Boar Bonus Policy.

Plans were made for meetings with breeders in the Veterinary Services Branch of the Department to make avilable the certified herd policy for swine breeders. The purpose of this policy would be to co-operate with breeders in establishing and maintaining swine herds that are free from rhinitis and pig pneumonia.

Exhibitors from the Province made very fine showings again at the Maritime Exhibitions, and two carloads of cattle were exhibited at the Royal Winter Fair, Toronto. I would like to submit here, Mr. Speaker, that we contributed $4,500 to the Atlantic Winter Fair and our earnings amounted to $30,000 at that Fair. This was prizes, sales of winning beef carcasses, and what have you. (Applause) We can be very proud of our Island producers. We have had the opportunity to congratulate all those various exhibitors through correspondence and now I would like to do it from the floor of this House. (Applause)

Exhibitors from the Province made very fine showings once again at exhibi- tions and two carloads of cattle were exhibited at the Royal Winter Fair, Toronto.

Our Veterinary Division, veterinary services, once again had an extremely busy year. The total number of farm calls in 1967 increased by 500. There was an in- crease in the number of conditions treated in cattle by 1,000, horses by 700, in swine by 400, and sheep, 80. The calls per area per month are reported in Table One in the Report of the Department of Agriculture, and I must say, Mr. Speaker, that I apologive for not having the Department of Agriculture Report on the desks. but the printing press is our problem. We were supposed to have it the first of the week; I think they will be here tomorrow. I didn’t think I would be speaking until tomorrow either. Anyway they are not just here but we will be getting them to- morrow, I am quite sure.

One would conclude that there is more work being done per call. This means that veterinarians are treating more and more conditions on each farm per visit. Now this in turn means an increase in efficiency for both the farmer and the Veter- inary Services Division.

There was also an increase in the workload of the diagnostic laboratories this past year. 4-00 more samples were submitted from cattle than the previous year, 100 more pig submissions, 200 more horse submissions and dog and cat submissions increased by over 100%. We have very good facilities now. They were there by the previous administration and it certainly is a wonderful assistance to my head veter- inarian, Dr. Kelly, to have this convenient place to work. People come in there and everything is really, I think, in very good shape there.

Although we do not have a definite mastitis control program, a number of farmers are submitting routine samples from their herds and are developing their own mastitis control program. This is a problem that dairy farmers always have, especially high producing cows, which are very subject to injury and there is a lot being done by the farmers themselves.

The Artificial Breeding Program continues to be very successful. The concep- tion rate for the province for the year was 68% With no club gomg below 63% con- ception. The previous year’s conception rate was 65%.

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