WINTER IN SOUTHLAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 August 1938, Page 4

WINTER IN SOUTHLAND

(To the Editor.) Sir,—One does not object to the plan of cheering the farmer in an unfavourable season by telling him someone somewhere else is worse off; but the picture of a Southland winter given on page 5 of your issue of August •8 is taking the cheering process a little too far. Undoubtedly snowfalls on the high levels will be heavy in winter, but in the greater part of the province of Southland snow is never heavy enough to stay on the ground for more than g week, and frequently there are no snowfalls during the winter. The idea, ..iat in Southland motor-car radiators must be drained at nights during the winter is preposterous, and it is absurd to suggest that i kerosene. lamps are kept burning to prevent household pipes freezing up. These things may be done on the high levels, but to say 'that they represent conditions in Southland is like saying that because snow covers the Tararuas in winter one may ski in the streets if Masterton. Your article may have dealt with conditions in the high country about. Wakatipu, but the writer has given the impression that the conditions he describes belong to Southland, of which the high country in question is. a small part. Having lived for seventeen years in Southland I know something of its climate. —Yours etc., J. J. W. POLLARD, Director, South Islands Travel Association. Christchurch, August 1.