GYPT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 July 1940, Page 9

GYPT

■ »AiMITIVE ,i)S USED THREE CROPS A YEAR. SOUTHLANDER'S VIEWS. Farming implements used in Egypt would make a New Zealand farmer’s hair stand on end, according to a letter from Lance-Corporal L. W. Minchey, at present in Egypt, to Mr A. W. Taylor, of Invercargill. Lance-Corporal Hinchey was, prior to his enlistment, employed on ’ the Souhland Frozen Meat Company’s Southdown estate, of which Mr Taylor is in charge. “My word, you would get an eyeopener about farming over here,” states the letter from Egypt. “Three crops a year! The /Gyppos’ are very primitive in their methods but they certainly get results. Rice, cotton, beans, potatoes and wheat seem to be the mam crops on intensely cultivated land. Every inch is utilised, watered and worked.

“I have seen only one tractor since I came here used for the purpose of cultivation, and the implements would make a New Zealand farmer’s hair stand on end. One man was driving the tractor, and there were about six Gyppos, each with an old wooden plough hitched by rope to the trunk of a date palm, which if. turn was hitched by rope to the tractor. I didn t wait to see any more. , “In the harvest the crop is cut and tied into bundles by ‘Wog’ or Gyppo women, gathered up into heaps by children and threshed by hand all at once. No necessity for stocking as at home. “But most surprising of all is that the Egyptian Government has a Department of Agriculture and their .system of using artificial manures is almost on a par with ours in New Zealand. In feet. I was reading recently in the paper that the producing capacity of the land was being impaired by the use of artificial manures, and it was proposed to plough in crops of lucerne. Since the Nile has been stopped flooding the farming areas, three crops a year have been taken off the land and without the help of the silt and flooding, manures must be used. So the gyppo is wide-awake to what is going to happen. “The stock are pretty miserable specimens. The sheep, or whatever they are called, are long-tailed and coarse —woolled of, it seems, all colours. They show many characteristics of the Romney but are finer in the bone and poorer across the withers and back. The tail is a magnificent affair. Where it leaves the breech it is almost as wide as the breech and narrows down, heartshaped, to an ordinary tail. When the carcase is dressed it is a ghastly-look-ing thing, but apparently a great delicacy. They are fed almost entirely on lucerne, which is grown profusely. Rather a peculiar thing about these sheep is that they are never driven, being always led by a leader which in turn is led by a Gyppo. The remainder follow like Mary’s lamb. “The cattle are dual-purpose —haulage and beef. They are grey in colour and, I think, originally came from India. The milk has a strong flavour and is rich, but it makes beautiful butter and has quite a good market with the gyppo community. These cattle are very tractable and will go in any yoke and in value are considered greater than that of a wife, which isn’t much. They are also fed on lucerne. By the way, the lucerne is fed green to them and they don’t ‘blow’ like our New Zealand cows.

“The farms, as far as I can gather, all belong to the State and are leased to the Gyppos in very small blocks. The largest, I should imagine, would be about 20 acres. There are no fences, and the boundaries are made by irrigation ditches and canals. Irrigation is the life of this country and is carried out in dozens of ways—some ingenious, others primitive. The Gyppo is very patient and will work like blazes for water, especially to raise it to a higher level. One method is an endless belt-with buckets tacked on to it in various places, similar to a gravel-screening plant. He turns it by hand, and perhaps raises 50 gallons an hour into a race three or four feet higher. Another is to train a camel or a cattle beast to walk round and round in a circle, while attached to a large wheel which meshes with a smaller one on the crown and bevel principle, thus turning the belt and lifting the water. This may be done two or three times to get water where he wants it. “The worst method of all is that of women carrying water in earthenware jars on their heads and watering the individual plants. Another is to kill a pig and skin it as we would: a rabbit —an arduous job—tie up the openings, fill with water and carry on their shoulders. I have often seen men carrying anything up to 40 gallons. It is quite a common sight to see a Gyppo woman with a kerosene tin full of water marching along and not spilling a drop. These are just some of the labours required to get those three crops a year. “We are getting Argentine bully beef just now, and it is marvellous —much finer in the grain than our New Zealand product, and not so salty. It used to be a bit of a job to eat the New Zealand article, but there is none of this Argentine left after a meal. The food is good, and although we are all a bit restless to get ‘stuck into’ the war, we are pretty happy and contented.”