WINTON NOTES.

Southern Cross, Volume 1, Issue 30, 28 October 1893, Page 5

WINTON NOTES.

The dullness of trade for some months past has brought most of our business people into a chronic state of grumbling, but now that spring is well advanced our hopes are brightening, and in a few weeks w.e expect to see a little more activity in trade. The coin of the realm has been very scarce amongst farmers and tradesmen, and not being a companyfloating community, our progress has been slower perhaps than commercial travellers and others would desire.

The Jockey Club have received a large number of nominations for the races on the 9th November, and it is expected the acceptances will he such as will ensure a very successful meeting. With the advance of the season the appearance of Winton improves. Surrounded as it is by native bush, the ®reat variety of colour gives the town at this time of the year a charm possessed by few of the country centres of Southland. Where the natural growth has given place to the homes of the people, spring time has been well anticipated and the productiveness of the soil in the hands of industrious people is shown on all sides by garden plots well filled with vege - tables, fruit, trees and flowers. While on this subject I may remark that when at the Winton Nursery the other day, I was shown a stalk of rhubarb with a girth of seven inches. It was the “ Excelsior’. Rhubarb, the kind that received first prize at the Dunedin Exhibition. Not two years ago where the nursery (about two acres) now stands was dense bush, fully 120 large trees being taken out of it. Messrs O’Brien Bros, have spent close upon LBO per acre in clearing, draining, and trenching it, and believe that no better soil could be found in Southland for the purpose of raising seedlings, &c., while the healthy growth of all vegetable life and the prolific blossom upon the young fruit trees testify to the correctness of the opinion. Rather a no /elty in its way is a border to the pathway of macrocarpa, which, though four years old, is only six inches in height, a border of the same height in their other nursery being seven years old. Among the seedlings are most of the well known English trees, including the oak, elm, and larch. Of the latter Messrs O’Brien just recently planted close upon 1000 on the Redden Bush station. By the way, it is a pity that farmers do not plant more useful deciduous trees as a substitute for the maiden bush, which is fast disappearing in and around Winton alone to the extent of sixty or seventy trees a week. In order to thoroughly test the growing qualities and nature of several varieties of potatoes, Messrs O’Brien Bros, have planted a number of rows. Each kind received the same treatment, and was put in on the same day. So far the White Elephant is leading, and the first crop, it is expected, will be ready by December Ist, and 22 tons to the acre is the estimated yield. On another plot an experiment is being tried with a new potato—the Flower of Aaron —and strong hopes are entertained of a yield of 26 tons to the acre. The latest in potatoes, however, is a kind called the Frostless, which is frost-proof. It is a second early potato, and, if its name doesn’t belie it, should be found very suitable in Southland, where late frosts are not unfrequent. In addition to the improvement of the ground, Mr M. O’Brien has had erected upon the property a comfortable and well-finished dwellinghouse, and although he ever affirms that he will die a bachelor, even his friends now begin to doubt him.