NEGLECTED ACRES

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2184, 24 June 1914, Page 9

NEGLECTED ACRES

NORTH ISLAND CENTRAL PLATEAU. Addressing the Board of Agriculture at its recent meeting, Mr. J. G. Wilson (chairman), pointed to tho existence in the North Island of a great central plateau, comprising millions of acres which were practically doing nothing, or, rather, worse than nothing, because they were growing noxious weeds. "The Nativos there have had large areas of land, and the weedß, such as Californian thistle, ragwort, and sweetbriar, are Spreading over hundreds of acres," Mr. Wilson continued. "I think, it will be the duty of' the Board to take that fully into consideration. There is plenty of land on that plateau which will grow excellent grassland turnips. The ono thing wanted is manure, and in order to get manuro to that class of country you must have access. They have no access at tho present time. Tho roads there are practically impassable. Bullock drays are stuck there constantly, and the drivers themselves have actually to go and niend the roads in order to get through at all. That is not a satisfactory state of affairs. And when you recollect that- ten thousand fat sheep left Rotorua for Auckland last year it shows that there is an enormous future for that district. The mechanical condition of the soil there is good, and all they want is plan Wood in the shape of manure. This means that roads must be provided. Will the Minister supply these? I sincerely hope he will, when considering the opening of tho backblocks, consider that subject, because it is one of vital importance to the country."

' The Prime Minister, who was present, said that he had taken the opportunity about fifteen months ago of looking at pumice, oountry referred to by the chairman, and he was quite willing to > admit that it was country where great improvement was possible. "A lot of it has been taken up by private individuals in very largo blocks, in some cases up to 60,000 acres and 70,000 acres, and much of it still remains in the hands of the Natives," 'he went on to remark. "But there is a fairly largo proportion held by the Crown, and as far as the .Crown is concerned wo propose to go on settling it as opportunity offers. We propose to go on surveying those blocks and having them cut up into suitable sizes, so that they may b6 available to ; settlerfi:l would willingly ■ do 1 a great deal more in- that direction, but the great drawback is the difficulty in getting, fertilisers, there; and. even ,if wo iex<si "pense of' cartage.' would' be prohibitive; Personally I do not think we shall be able to' deal satisfactorily with _ tho greater part of that country until'we have railway communication and tho settlers are able to get their fertilisers. tliero,at railway fates. But tho whole of that country is not pumice country. For instance, the block owned by Messrs Stead and Watt is really good land, and above the average land of the Dominion. It is not pumice country in tho ordinary sense of the word. I do not ' know what Messrs. Stead and Watt propose to do with it, but I am convinced that in the future it will carry a large number of settlers. In fact, my opinion is that all that pumice country will come ,in in time, and t|he Government should do a)l they can to assist by way of experiments and otherwise. Tho position is, so far as I am able to judge, that the ordinary pumice land is worth very little to commence with. If a man of "practical experience tt.kes up a thousand acres of that country, by the time he has spent £5 an acre upon it he will probably be able to make a living, and the land will he worth £5 per acre or a little more." Mr. Wilson: The Treasury will not get much out of it. Mr. Massey: No, but we want to encourage people who will spend money upon it to take it up. It would bo worth a good deal more than £5 an acre with railway_ communication, and will go on improving; but, as far as'l am able to judge, it is not likely to get railway communication for some time to come. It has a good climate, most of it is weir watered, and the soil is light land which i 3 easily worked, and it will improve with every time of turning over. I feel sure good settlers could bring it' in and grow suitable grasses upon it just as they liave done on a lot of light land in the Waikato district.