PROMINENT BOTANIST

Hokitika Guardian, 7 January 1928, Page 2

PROMINENT BOTANIST

TO TOUR DOMINION. WELLINGTON, Jan. 5. Owing to altered steamer arrangements Dr A. D\ . Hill. I*.R.S., C.DI.G.. Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, will now commence his tour

of the Dominion this month at Auckland instead of at DVellington as was originally intended. As a consequence the proposed itinerary will he reversed.

Dr Hill is at present visiting Canberra. and Sydney, and his latest communication to ' the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research states that he will he leaving on Tuesday for Tasmania, where he will remain until January 17th. He will leave Sydney by the Ulimaroa on January 20th for Auckland, where he is due oil January 21th. The itinerary mapped out for the North Island includes visits to the kauri forest or Ramr.itoto Island and the Domain, Auckland, to the forestry plantations and native forests at Rotorua, to Taupp. and the National Park, and to (he (lax swamps and pastoral lands ol the Manawatu. While in Wellington Dr Hull will hold consultations with the Depnrt,ucnl of Scientific and Industrial Research. He will visit Waiuuiomatn in company with the Director of Parks and Reserves and will he the guest of honour at a reception to" be tendered by Hie New Zealand Institute of Horticulture in the Concert Chamber of the Town Hall, where a special display

of New Zealand (lowers will he given. Tn the South Island Dr Hill is to

visit Christchurch and will inspect the forest services at Hanmer and the plantations of the Hon S. R. Heaton Rhodes. Other visits include calls at Arthur’s Pass, Hokitika, and Nelson. A walk- from Arthur’s Pass to Otira is contemplated. It is doubtful whether time will permit of a visit to Dunedin.

The occasion is Ihe first on which the Director for the Royal Botanic Gardens has been enabled to travel to the Dominions and the colonies, the departure being made possible by the action of the Empire Marketing Board in making a grant to the Tvew authorities to permit them to send abroad from time to time members of their staff to study problems of economic botany. It is the aim of the Empire Marketing Board to make Kew a central bureau on Empire botanic problems, an object encouraged by the services that establishment has already rendered to the banana and rubber producing portions of the Empire. Dr Hill will be in the Dominion until February 13th.