CITY’S PLANTATIONS

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 98, 19 January 1935, Page 6

CITY’S PLANTATIONS

Ever-present Menace of Grass Fires DIRECTOR’S ANXIETY No one is having a more anxious time during this season of drought than the Director o£ Parks and Reserves (Mr. J. G. MacKenzie). During the last ten to fifteen years the City Corporation has, through its reserves department, undertaken a great deal of tree-planting on the Town Belt which surrounds the city. This planting embraces areas at Roseneath, Mt. Victoria, Melrose, the hill slopes below' Mornington, and the Tinakori range to the westward of Wellington North. With grass and gorse tires of daily occurrence, the director and his staff are kept actively on the move to protect these planted areas, as the work and growth of years could easily be wiped out by an extensive fire. Only on Wednesday last the planted area at Roseneath. above Oriental Bay, was in peril of destruction by a very fierce gorse and grass fire, which was only prevented reaching a section of young pines by the tire-break fortunately provided there. In "another instance on the western hills the director had some men working in separate gangs only fifty yards apart. Y fire broke out between the two parties. Fortunately it was seen almost at once and the men rushed to the spot and beat out the flames, but not before they had spread over a square of some twenty yards. It seems that a man had been seen sitting on the grass at the spot. In lighting a cigarette or his pipe he probably threw down a lighted match in the tinderdry grass. Buch carelessness is inexcusable, and Mr. MacKenzie hopes, in the interest of the municipal plantations, which are to play such an important part in the beautification of the city’s environs, that people will exercise the greatest care, not only with matches, but in throwing away cigarette stubs and knocking out their pipes.