Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE. THURSDAY, APRIL 8, 1915. THE CALIFORNIAN THISTLE.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 182, 8 April 1915, Page 4

Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE.

THURSDAY, APRIL 8, 1915. THE CALIFORNIAN THISTLE.

(With which is incorporated The Taj hapo Post Mia Wttimarint! News.)

For. some years- farmers have been almost, if' not quite, immune from harassing- inspectorialattentions in connection with the enforcement of the Noxious Weeds Act, so far as the cutting' of'Califbrnian thistle is concerned; hut a number of informations having been laid by departmental inspectors, and heard at the Stipendiary Magistrate's Court, has once again brought the subject under' direct public notice. Why punitory measures have been reinstituted, after so long a period of inactivity did not transpire during th(> Courl proceedings, but if may be the Agricultural 'Department has furnished this district with a new broom. In such a case we should, of course, have been prepared for a little unusual clean crc-p*'-? TV-f r.n-t r>? ti. Act, however, wiiieh m:-.! compulsory for farmers to cut California]! thistle had become to be regarded as obsolete, and it iq perfectly true to say that not one of those before the Court ever anticipated such a surprise beingsprung upon them. It would be interesting to know what has induced r al DepaftiticM &is den raidj upon farmers after years of quiesfnee, Jor we should then know just where Ave are and be . enabled "to select the attitude to "take up.'; It may only begone of those tangents that Government departments not infrequently go Off at, and after this one aberrant •outbreak nothing further will be heard;of it, In face of the, facts brought to light in the Court b one of those prosecuted, the sudden determination of the Department is extraordinary. Of course, so long as an Act of Parliament is on the Statute Book procedure is liable to be taken under its pro--visions. We occasionally hear of cases arising under laws enacted

as the reign of Kill's but such procedure be • a matter of world surprise f|i|| thre fact is cabled "to every 'civilised nation on earth". People, quite reasonably, do not expect laws that have been allowed to fall intodesuetudc owing- to their anti(juati6n and irnsu it ability to

be unearthed and resurrected, and although there is nothing of the King (Vhark-s age about the Noxious Weeds Act, is constraining clauses with respect to ffhe cutting of California!! thistles have wiitingy been left inoperative for several years. About four year:-; ago the Department became ,>•'.:-•-

scssod of evidence that threw eon- i siderable doubl on the advisabil-' ity of cutting this thistle, and h Commission was appointed to bold an enquiry. The Commis- I sion sat in Taihape, n\\.<\ out of aboul one hundred farmers who gave evidence, only three or fourwere in favour of cutting, and we believe we are correct in saying that even those three or four have had occasion to entirely reverse their opinions. While 99 per cent, of farmers are averse to cutting as no beneficial results are derivable therefrom, surely the Department is not going to the length of enforcing by prosecution a law seemingly framed by an insufficiently informed legislature. Only a month or two ago all local governing bodies received a circular request for information on this question, and if one may be guided by newspaper reports of discussions there is certainly a large majority of farmers in the North Island that condemn cutting. In places whore no decision was come to it was admittedly because there was no thistle in the district or they knew little about it. A correspondent of one of our Waimarino contemporaries questioned the virility of the Californian thistle seed and instanced the presence of the weed on a burn that was made after the seeding season had passed. A strong crop of plants appeared only, a month or 1 two after burning that were quite ', too large to have come from seed. ' He had no hesitation in asserting that the plants came from roots that had survived in the ground thus making good his contention that the plant spread more from the root than from the'seed. Some nine or ten years'ago, by some unaccountable means, a patch of thistles about three yards in diameter was discovered on s farm about three milos from Levin. It was a novelty arrl every farmer within a few miles' radius went to see it, and by a consensus- of opinion, -including that of the "Experimental Farm o. .eials, the thistles were isolated by a trench about three feet deep being dug all round them, and the plants were, cut to prevent any possibility of seeding; but in a very short time thistles were shooting from the sides of the trench and eventually from the bottom and up the oilier side, and some scientifically inclined observers had no doubt left in their minds that it was top pruning that caused such Vigorous growth from underground eyes which the plant is undoubtedly provided with, or develops under the process of top pruning. Is it possible that the Department, with its swarms of officials and inspectors, is unacquainted with the natural peculiarities of the plant? If it is, its existence is not being justified; if,it is not, then these harassing .prosecutions are not uncle** statutable to intelligent people.