FLOOD STORIES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 118, 21 May 1938, Page 16

FLOOD STORIES.

HAWKE'S BAY LOSSES. FARMERS COME TO TOWN. PASTURES OBLITERATED. ' (By Telegraph.—Special to " Star.") NAPIER, this day. Nearly four weeks after the flood which devastated thousands of acres of Hawke's Bay countryside a number of farmers from backblock properties are only now reaching the towns for the first time. Stories which they bring with them confirm the belief held at the time of the disaster that damage in isolated localities would be exceedingly heavy. A farmer from the Te Pohue district, who was able to reach Napier for the first time this week, reports that apart from damage to fences and buildings and heavy loss of stock his property has been completely denuded of 1200 acres of hillside pasture. Pastures of the Te Pohue area have been obliterated by slips, which have not merely removed grass and topsoil, but have washed the soil right back to bare rock. Very little of the * area is worth sowing again. Another"farmer in the same locality has lost just on a thousand acres in the same way. Delayed effects of the 1931 earthquake are held to have been largely responsible for such extensive earth movements on hill country. Both the properties in question are in a district which was very severely affected by the earthquake, and the ground had been further loosened by occasional rainstorms in the past seven years, so that when the torrential rains of the last month fell the soil offered no resistance and was swept to the bottoms of the gullies. It is expected that the Government will find it necessary to consider relief measures for owners of such properties. Relief so far has been concentrated on the assistance of farmers whose properties were damaged by silt deposits. Erosion of hillsides is a related problem, but a distinct one, and it is likely that it will warrant equal investigation and corresponding attention.