NELSON NOTES.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1652, 20 January 1913, Page 10

NELSON NOTES.

PEA-GROWING. AT RICHMOND,

During a rccent visit to Nelson, our travelling correspondent had a gianco nt the district which supplies tho Wellington 'market with its early peas. This was in and near Richmond'. . It ■is simply wonderful, says tho writer in question, to see tho steepness of some oi the pea paddocks. It makes.ono wonder'how the ploughing is done. Of .course only a hillside plough could accomplish the work, but in addition to .this peas are grown in More hilly ground still—too steep to plough—aiid this is turned up with 1 the grubber. Tho secret of these farmers being so .early in tho'market is that the peas are grown above the frost line. No frosts are experienced on tho hillsides, though there are frequently very low temperatures lower 'down. As,tho season advahccs the hillside crops become picked out, and (food money has generally been made-by thfl extremely satisfactory prices which the growers obtain. -Four shillings and sixpence to five shillings a peck is not at all unknown by tho earliest growers, but when the crops.on the aro being gathered tho,.prico,' of course, comes'down,: ■ Pea-growing at Richmond and Brightwater' has paid . the, farmers handsome wturns for 6omo years. According to one grower, even nt sixpence per peck there is money in pea-growirig. The pickers can make up to ten shillings a day, and many families .make a substantial addition to their : income by pea-picking— ha much as fifty . pounds {or the season. Pickers aro paid Is. 3d. ..to Is. Gd. per gunny, bag at the beginning of the esason, and. Is.-later. A gunny holds about nine pecks..

Richmond is at 'the bosinning' of the ffl.nied Waiinea Plains, a fine farming district, principally devoted to cropping, 6ucli as wheat, olts, and barley, the latter Icing considered equal in quality to that grown in Marlborough.' There 'is ' also a considerable number of dairy cattle in the district. What' appears strange to , a North Islander* is the smallncss, of the paddocks—in. many cases'a very few acres' But as nearly all the farms nro small also, it-is hot after all so much a matter of , surprise. In fact, taking Nelson on tho. whole,- it maiy be called a country of small farms and close settlement. Large farms as known in the north are ifbncxistent. 'Even, the sheepruns are small, and .-there, is not a , "station" in the ordinary sense in the ' province. At Appleby, tho land is a little heavier and better known than at 'Richmond, and the crops in this quarter looked better in every way. There nre some lnrg-9 fruitfiirnis about the district, kept in splendid condition, a'ud some fine milking countryis seen about Appleby.