SETTLEMENT OF THE MAKERUA.

Shannon News, 5 September 1922, Page 3

SETTLEMENT OF THE MAKERUA.

BIG AREA TO BE THROWN OPEN,

A large area of the Makerua swamp lands, which are no longer profitable for iiaxmilling owing to the ravages of the yellow leaf disease, is shortly to be turned to better account and converted into fanning property. The country affected will comprise some 13,000 acres, and is owned by the Haxmiliers in that district. The sysetm of hanking which is now being undertaken will free the land from the danger of tloods, which will be necessary when settlement commences. A roading sysetm has already been laid out, and Messrs Seifert will commence the surveying of their portion of the area to be cut up within a lew weeks. The scheme has been held up to some extent by the general conditions prevailing, but preparations are progressing steadily, and everything is in order for commencing at any time.

NEW MAIN ROAD

Part oi the scheme provides for a main road running from the Makerua railway station through the settlement area to the Manawatu River, joining up on the other side with ihe present'- main road to] Palmerston. The route across the Makerua country i‘s level, and in time should provide. a popular means of travel, besides having the advantage of reducing the distance to - Palmerston by some six miles. It will also, cut out the hilly country on the present Tokomaru and Fitzherbert route, and in fact will give level going from Paekakariki to any of the northern districts. The: settlement scheme, however, does not provide for the bridging of the Manawatu at Rangilane. This will be a matter for the Government. IDEAL FARMING COUNTRY.

Freed from the flood menace and properly drained and settled, the Makerua should make ideal farming country. The experience in other parts of New Zealand with drained swamp is of the most successful kind, and it is not too much to forecast that in the course of a few years prosperous farms will dot the landscape. Even in its present rough condition the land produces a luxuriant growth of native and other grasses of firstrate. fattening quality. Mr R. T. Beil and other owners have some very tine tracts of swamp land under grass, where the growth is excellent, and has given the best results in the fattening of stock. The land in quality should not differ to any great extent from that of the Moutoa, or the Kuku at Oliau, and these two localities are recognised as the most productive on- this coast, and equal to the best in the Dominion. That being so, the scheme, whilst involvinga large sum of money and an immense amount of labour, has every prospect of success ahead, and should be thoroughly sound from a business point of view. When the plans have been matured, and farm holdings occupy the land which has hitherto been covered with flax and the usual swamp growths, the whole future of this part of the country will be changed. The flax harvests of old will give place to the production of butterfat and other farm produce, and knowing the quality of the land, numerous families should find profitable employment and comfortable homos on the new settlement which the energy and far-sightedness of the present owners is bringing into being.