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Te Aroha News, Volume XXVI, Issue 43070, 19 March 1907, Page 2

Residents generally around the Hungahunga swamp district will be glad indeed to learn that the Hungahunga Drainage Board, which was elected in April last, will very shortly call tenders for cutting the first several miles of drains. The total length of drains involved in the scheme is thirty-two miles, so that contractors will all have a fair chance of securing a share of the work from time to time. Perhaps many people in this district have scarcely yet realised the benefits that will arise from the drainage of the swamp land which when cleared would no doubt be at once worth treble its present value, which is certainly not more than £4 per acre, whilst the average must be nearer half that amount. One quarter of the total 24,000 acres of swamp, is good flax land, and five or six mills, which would be erected at convenient points along the Waihou River, could be kept running incessantly, whilst there is a large amount of land that with proper treatment will make excellent pasture. As showing the great advantages to be gained by even a small amount of drainage, we recall a statement made a ivhile ago in a contemporary by a once Government valuer, who in 1887 had to value a block near Waitoa on the verge of the Piako Swamp,. under the “ Property Tax Assessment Act.” It was mostly dead water., and the valuer told his chief it was valueless, but nevertheless he had to fill in the block and put it down at five shillings per acre. It was like valuing the Ilauraki Gulf for growing maize, or the top of Te Aroha for producing trout, the valuer said. Some ten years after, however, he had to value portions of the same block under the “ Advances to Settlers Act,” and found that where a decade before, there was twelve inches of waterdead water —there grew eighteen inches of clover, which was valued at about £8 per acre. This was brought about with only a little local drainage, so it is manifest that anyone who will take up land on the Hungahunga and determinedly buckle to and work hard for a few years, will in the end meet just reward for his labours. The sum of £5,000 will be expended in order to complete the drainage scheme which has been drawn up.