GRASSLAND CONFERENCE.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 214, 10 August 1937, Page 5

GRASSLAND CONFERENCE.

MR E. BRUCE LEVY’S PAPER. OF RAIN FOREST. Mr E. Bruce Levy, of Palmerston North, who attended the Fourth International Grassland Congress at Aberystwyth, North Wales, in July, read a paper on the conversion of rain forest to grassland in. New Zealand. Delegates from all parts of the world attended and described various aspects of grassland farming in their countries. The papers read were afterwards printed in English and German. Mr Levy said that the area of forest felled and sown in Now Zealand was approximately 14,000,000 acres, of which 12,000,000 acres had been more or less successfully grassed The fovests converted were mainly of two types: (1) Rain forest proper, and (2) sub-Ant-arctic forest. Ihe former had been move Beach forest. The former had Ll.'ii more successfully converted than the latter. The main forest formations and as«x ciations and those of natural fern and scrub wero dealt with, together with some aspects of forest succession, felling of the forests, filing of the burn, sowing the seed, the grass seed mixtures used, tracking of tho burn where necessary, fencing to control stock, classes of stock used, and early management of the burn, together with costs of the main operations. Ihe influence of climalo and management on succession following the primary burn to a point where there was attained a com- ' paratively stable climax was discussed and reference was made to grassland, fern, scrub or forest, and the various factors responsible for such succession. Mr Levy also dealt with classes of secondary growth, and the coni rol of these once they had become established; the carrying capacity of the varying types of country and swards, and the general practices of management. Maintenance costs and the appreciation of the factors that made hill country farming economical or otherwise, were touched upon, and the paper, which throughout was illustrated by original lantern slides, concluded with some insight into the life of the pioneei back-country bush settlers and the vicissitudes of their fortunes.