Progress in Southern Auckland.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XIV, Issue 2910, 28 February 1893, Page 3

Progress in Southern Auckland.

The progress manifested in the north is also characterising the older established settlements south of Auckland. Owing to the exceptionally wet season, the Waikato plains are covered with a wealth of pasturage which I have not. seen excelled in twenty years; Everywhere I went the farmers were contented, through the improved prices for cattle and sheep. The calves which they had been knocking on the head as not worth the trouble of rearing are now bringing 25s to 30s per head, and even over. The phenomenal weather experienced had delayed the harvesting and injured the crops slightly, but this has been compensated for by the splendid feed carried through the summer. Of late years the Waikato farmers are giving up, grain-growing, and relying principally on cattle and sheep as being more profitable. As showing the growth of the wool industry, it may be stated thac in 1891 Auckland imported 90,000 J sheep from Napier, while in laist year only half that number were obtained. This year it may be regarded as tolerably certain that the Auckland sheep district wiU meet its own requirement?, white 20,000 prime wethers will be put through the Auckland Freezing Works and shipped to London. The Estates Company and the Loan and Mercantile | are expending considerable sums in improving estates in their possession, and this expenditure is having a beneficial influence upon the smaller settlers in the vicinity and also the middle-class farmets, who have been likewise stimulated to improve their properties by the example set them. As the result of this policy on the part of the great financial institutions some of the large estates are nrnr carrying double the number of sheep they did a few yeifos ago, while, made wise by experience, the management is less expensive and more efficient. Nothing j brought more forcibly to my mind the progressive changes going on iv the Wai- > kato than the state of things in the Ohaupo district. I last visited it in 1879 j -the terminus of the Waikato railway, a railway and telegraph station, a publichouse, and a few humble farmers' dwellings being all that indicated colonisation. During the past fortnight 5U.000 sheep have been yarded and sold there, buyers j coming from Auckland to the north, from the lhames Valley, and even from Raglan on the west coast. The district is set;led by a prosperous, hardy yeomanry, whose smiling homesteads have replaced the dangerous swamp-or bush. In the Thames Valley the same changes are going on, the settlers eschewing graingrowing, and keeping to cattle-raising and sheep-breeding, for which the district is well adapted. On the great estates there a definite scheme of improvement is being carried out on well considered lines, and the circulation of the i money entailed is bin fiting libor as well as capital. Employees and employed are alike looking to the future with hope and confidence, believing that the agricultural, and more especially thspastor?!, interests, are about to enjoy a fresh era of prosperity.— " Utago Daily Times" Correspondent.