PHORMIUM TENAX.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 2384, 26 January 1922, Page 3

PHORMIUM TENAX.

The New Zealand flax plant, which is indigenous ouly to this country and Norfolk 'lsland, is now growing well in Japan from some seeds sent to that country nearly four years ago by Mr J. W. Poynton, S.M., at Auckland, who is an ardent botanist. A letter received by Mr Poynton from a Japanese in Toyohashi city, Aichi Prefecture, Japan, states that the seeds sent by Mr Poynton in May, 1918, were planted by the Department of Agriculture and Commerce in the colonies of Chosen and Formosa, but did not grow well. The plant, however, flourished in Japan, and grew to sft or Gft. in height without special attention. Strangely enough, however, the flax plant bears no seeds in Japan, and the only way of multiplying it is to divide the roots. The writer asks for two pints of flax seeds, and encloses a specimen of its fibres and a sheet of good white paper made from the fibres. Mr Poynton says that the reason that the flax will not grow well in the colonies of Japan was that there were no honey-eating birds and insects to collect flax honey and so distribute the pollen as the tui did in our bush. The flax, by reason of its commercial value and adaptability, was being planted and grown in various places throughout the world, and its fame was spreading. In the Orkney Islands it had seeded well, and it was now flourishing in the Isle of Skye, while at St. Helena, in the tropics, the people were growing it for export and commercial purpoes. Its adaptability was shown by the fact that it grew in sand and dry gravel on the west coast of New Zealand, and at the snowline of the hills near Lake Wanaka. Although it was not an annual, it grew abundantly, and by a process of selection it might be made to bear every two or three years instead of five. The flax plant produced 35 tons of green leaf, yielding over four tons of fibre, to the acre, whereas the annual jute plant of India produced a quarter ton of fibre to the acre; the banana plant, from which Manila was obtained, yielded IS tons of leaf to one ton of fibre, and the Mexican sisal plant 25 tons to one ton of fibre.

AN INTERESTING LETTER

RECEIVED FROM AMERICA

Mr Alfred Seifert, of Palmerston North, has received the following communication from a large firm of hemp brokers in New York, under date December Kith: —“1 was very pleased indeed to receive your favour of the sth inst. I have also had the pleasure of reading your report published in the Manawatu Daily Times of October 2(11 h, and wish to congratulate you on the thoroughness of the report. It seems to me that you have reached the root of the difficulty which has impeded the course of business in New Zealand hem)) in this country, and I sincerely trust that it will be possible for you to bring about such improvement as will re-establish your fibre in the cordage trade of this country. I am inclined to believe that the fibre trade has passed through its worst stages, and that with th» new year we shall see a distinct improvement in the tone of the markets, and also better prices than those which have prevailed throughout the present year. The Yucatan sisal situation is somewhat improved, and the Yucatan State Government has just imposed a production tax of about 2:'- cents U.S. currency per pound on tha t fibre. In consequence, the price of Yucatan sisal has scored a. marked advance here during the past few days, and there is every indication that we shall see a steadier market in that fibre.”