HARVEST PROSPECT IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 16, Issue 904, 29 December 1870, Page 2

HARVEST PROSPECT IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

|_L¥TTELTON TIMES, DECEMBER 13.] The following, from a well informed correspondent, will .be read with great interest. It is dated Nov. 22:—"By the time this readies you the greater portion of 1870 will have passed, and it may be interesting to give a short account of the commercial transactions of the year in breadstuff's. Beginning with the first important sale of 5,000 bushels of the new crop at 4s 2d, which by-the-by was never completely delivered, the seller becoming meanwhile insolvent, and quickly rising before the end of January to 4s Bd, and thence to 53 in February, our wheat market ruled throughout extremely inactive. From February there was a slight rise of say Id.per bushel per month for about six months, making the price 5s 6d by the end of August. Then a sudden spring to 5s 9J, established by a sale of 20,000 bushels, and after a few weeks' quiescence a further spurt to 6s established by a sale of 30,000 bushels.. Both of these purchases were made by some of our leading millers for grinding, and not for export. After a. long spell of inactivity, with the price at 6s mostly nominal, but paid now and then by needy buyers, another large purchase from 18 000 to 20,000 bushels was made at a trifle under 6s, or say 5s lOd to 5s lid, and from thence our prices have gone down by the run. First a sale of 5,000 bushels at 5s Bd, then a parcel of two or three thousand at 5s 4d, and a similar one at 5s 3d, and then a sudden plunge at 4s 9\ at which the last sales were made, and at which the price stands to-day. Even at this price there are no anxious buyers, as the mills are mostly stopped working, and the nuiis are well supplied with flour and offd. But the price can scarcely go lower, as the re-< mainder of old crop is very limited and at whatever price the new opens the old will be all wanted for mixing. Some forward sales of the coming crop have been made at 4s 6d for delivery about the middle of December, and 4s 4d for last week in the present year down to 4s for January, which latter price is looked upon as too high if we have to depend on European markets, but taking the contingencies of our cereal future into account, probably 4s is about a shrewd guess, except at, our January prices. What the rate will be in the year it is impassible to guess, except with the vaguest approximation. The wants aud the prices of Europe, the failure or otherwise of the crops in the sister colonies, and last, but possibly not least, the freight power available and freight charges ex? acted for European transit, which each and.all materially influence the value of the coming crop. I may also notice that a heavy sale of flour for early January delivery has been made at a price with* held, but equivalent to the above wheat quotations. But little money has been won by speculation or milling. This result, especially as regards a speculation is partly to be attributed to the mistakes made in the statistical return of the yield, made, as usual, early in the season. And although made in previous years equally early, it has heretofore been marvellously correct. The estimate, for 1869-70 gave us 26,000 to 28,000 tons for export. We have already sent away some 36,000 tons, and probably shall ship a thousand more of the old crop. This unexpected, surplus has caused some heavy losses where the speculations have been apparently well planned, and but for this must have been profitable. We have been accustomed to rely a great deal on. our wheat returns, but with the experience of this years' shaken confidence we shall be at least doubtful in the future. As to any reliable account of the comincr harvest, you must remember that only cur earliest districts can send wheat to market so early as the middle of December, and that the great bulk of the crop will be harvested early in January. The cool weather which has prevailed during the last ten days checks the ripening of the grain, aud the occasional storms we are still having added to the effects of the heavy rainfall already registered, has- the same effect, But, although the maturity may be retarded, the yield and quality of the grain will be increased. It is still perhaps premature to risk any authoritative prognostication as to the coming crop. Whatever may be the result, I can only lay down as the basis of the preseut appearances, and leave the readers to; judge for themselves. Our large j)lain 4

extending from Port Adelaide and Glenelg through Gawler to Kapunda, and branching off at Roseworthy Station through the valley of the Gilbert to Kooringa (Burra Burra), is almost all under cultivation. In the neighborhoods of Adelaide and Port Adelaide, the standing crop is fairly goad, but many sections so foul that they have boen cut for hay, and the same has been largely done around Gawler. The crops are full of wild oats, which cut green, make good fodder, and often produce from two to three tons per acre, where probably two bushels of wheat .only can be- reaped"! Most of the clean crops about the Gawler district are thin and poor. En passant and explanatory, Gawler has tabulated the lowest rainfall in the colony. From Gawler to Kapunda, ia long level stretch of over thirty miles, there is a gradual improvement, and many paddocks promise twenty to twentyfive bushels per acre. From Roseworthy up the New N< rt'ieru Railway to the Burra, and from Kapunda by the coach road to the same township, the crops are uniformly good. Beyond the ' Burra, .cultivation has been'pushed much further northward than in any previous years. Being mostly new laud and the land mostly propitious, large quantities of wheat are expected to come forward from districts previously unrepresented in our corn market." From a correspondent in the Gilbert district, I hear to-day >. — " Around our district for miles the crops pf. wheat, with some exceptions, are very good, but away to the north they are much superior, some farmers calculating three or four tons of hay to the acre, and wheat beyond an average of twenty bushels; and from two others who are living long distances apart although in the same large districts, the reports, if scarcely so sanguine, are very good."