WHAT SETTLERS HAVE DONE.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1001, 16 December 1910, Page 10

WHAT SETTLERS HAVE DONE.

MAKING KAIPAKORO. Very few places 111 tho'. -WelliiißtoTiprovince, if any, compare with Kaiparoro 111.. its rainfall (says our travelling correspondent).- It is-six or seven miles from Eketahuna, jiist under an off-shoot of the highest' part of the*- Tararua Rangefe. 'Consequently, there is consideiable! Attraction • for any. rain - that may b6 t about.'• I was told by one of the principal* farmers that " tho average .of Kaiparoro is about one hundred inches per' year. 1 expressed a doubt, '-but ho said' there was 110 doubt about it, as the previous teacher "at tho school had forked it out. Thero is 110 doubt what-ever--that the rain-comes down very heavily. • - v *It -is ; a-great country for grass. Tho Bottlers now have their own cbccso fac•tdty:' opened this season. The lancT is very'well suited for dairying, it being chiefly co'cksioot country. Tiro settlers in KaijSaxoro-are, industrious. There is any 'land . under the . plough, and this ' is air the more creditable ,to farmers'when .one, outsiders., the bad bui'ns which follow Imslifalling in this district, - and the amount- of ; wet weather yhen' they aro stumping. Tho district is-chiefly devoted- to dairying.' The principal has.a fine property.of early, two 'thousand acres, a very large part-of which is ploughable. Some time ogo; there'was a sawmill, at wlnth 1 the surrounding, settlers found acceptable' employment when they were breaking .in their farms.- The mill was during tho last bush-fire season; and-it''has not been rebuilt. .well-known sheepfarm in tho district Parson's.- tho chairman .of . the I\qw-Zealand Dairy Union, whose factory is '-'at Kketahuna;-,, . -Xeiving Kaiparoro, 'tho road runs'over a ; .hill and ' then dc,scends-; to a beautiful flat country—Rongolrokako," called "!Rongo." .1-.was simply, amazed to see what' the; farmers havo.accomplished in a. few years. They.-liavo utterly changed the';! face of the country. ■ It is only abtiut six years siiice I was through the district before'; just after the last big shake. • I thought; at- ! that' time' as we drove'along 'what. an. uphill task the' Battlers had. hefdre them. ■ •To-day; one .sees ."beautiful, stumped paddocks, full of tho best of food, and a fine cheese factory, owned by the .settlers themselves/, '/Rongo" cheese.-has .made, a name .'for-itself all over the Dominion. 1-he way- in which' most of the - "Kongo" farms are kept, is a credit to the men ■R;ho/own; them. They nil seem to take a'pride in having their places look as well as possible. All seem to find time K>.:attena' to the gardens, as well'as the ordinary .work of the farm. And what a difference it makes in the look of a place when there is a. well-kept garden and "a bit—if . only a small bit—of closefchaved lawn. Those-.Eongokokako flats 'were very heavily, timbered, and the marvel is that the farmers have .cloared the'land 60 rSpoii.. To see some of these paddocks next, to' others where no clearing has yet\ been, done is an . eye-opener as • to what can be done by determined faTniers farming .their,own land.-