ASHBURTON COUNTY.

Press, Volume XLV, Issue 6964, 18 January 1888, Page 5

ASHBURTON COUNTY.

"With a continuance of the present hotweather, harvest operations will become pretty general in the lower portions of the Ashburton county during the ensuing fortnight. Already the machines have been busy in the oat paddocks, but most of the crops gone into have been a bit on the green side, and are cut for chaff. We had a few nice welcome showers of rain early on Saturday morning, and on Sunday evening heavy masses of watery-looking" clouds came up from the south-east. Towards morning these broke into a shower or two, and for a while it looked as though Mr Marmaduke Dixon's prophesy of a nor'-wester was going to bo drowned in a deluge of rain. I am afraid, however, that Mr Dixon knew too well what he was writing about when he stated that nor'-westers would' prevail from the 16th instant. At any rate, he has scored a point as far as the Ashburton county is concerned, for instead of a deluge of rain we had during Monday one of the most boisterous nor-west gales experienced this season, and it was a wind, too, that is calculated to do a considerable amount of damage by shaking out the ripe oats, and laying or otherwise breaking about the heavier crops of wheat. The previous nor-wester shook the grain a great deal, but the rain that followed helped to a very large extent to repair the damage. What will be the result after Mr Dixon's prophesied visitors have held their carnival it is hard to say, but It Is to be hoped the wild looking sky that lowers above as I am writing will assume a less threatening aspect before morning, and that the boisterous gusts of wind will expend themselves without doing any serious damage to the many splendid fields of corn that are to be seen throughout various parts of the country. During the past few weeks I have taken the opportunity of visiting many of the principal cereal growing portions of this great grainproducing county, and have taken a considerable amount of trouble in gathering information that would help mc ta arrive at a fairly approximate estimate ol the area of land under crop and the probable gross yield for the county. Generally speaking, the crops throughout the whole district nave never lookea more healthy or promised a better yield, though there are, unfortunately, a few exceptions; and these exceptions are to be met with in districts that, as a rule, give big records and cause the farmers to hail with gladness the tallies given at the threshing mills. Towards the foot of the hills many of the crops are backward, and unless we §et very favorable weather the yield will c scarcely up to the average; but lower down on tne plains there is little to complain of, while there is a very great breadth of grain country that the farmers have just cause to feel satisfied with. All round Springfield, Methven, Lyndhurst, Lauriston, away back to Winchmore, and then over through Dromore, Chertsey, and about Bakaia paddock after Eaddock of splendid - looking grain i to be met with, and in most instances the yield promises to be fully up to the average. All through the Seafield district present appearances favor an average crop of about twenty-two bushels to the acre, and this is some four or five bushels more than the usual result from oil this extensive area of medium quality land. Most of the seed was got In under favorable conditions and the unusual amount of rain that fell all through the early and later portion of the spring suited the district admirably and gave the crops a good chance of getting up and well covering the ground before tbe hot weather set in. In speaking of a twenty-two bushel wheat crop for the Seafiela district I know of a few bit« of land here and there that will not contribute anything like its fair proportion of this average, still, to take the area of country generally known as Seafleld I think my statement will be •pretty near the mark. Further over towards Scaview, and then away up tho north-eastern side of the Wakanui creek, there are many very heavy individual crops to be met with, and similarpleasing results are found between the Wakanm Creek and the Ashburton river, or in what is generally spoken of as the Wakanui district. The frequent overflows of tho Ashburton river seriously damaged a big extent of grain crop soon after It was well above the ground, so that taking this into, consideration, and also taking into account a few blocks of light land, what would otherwise have been an unusually heavy yield through the whole district, will be pulled down to about twenty-eight or twenty-nine bushels to the acre for wheat, and about thirty-two to thirty-five for oata. Throughout tbe Longbeach district the great bulk of the crop is looking remarkably well, and it is quite safe to predict that the general average will be. close up to that for tho Wakanui district, if not a bushel or two over. It is very hard to estimate the yield through the Willowby district at' present, for hero many of the farmers suffered from floods r right up to December, and the crops are

•onsequentiy Very patchy. On the li^*** c lands, away up on the western side of the railway line, there will be some very satis- y .factory yields. ... . X . _ After crossing a branch of the Asnburton river, three miles above the town, one gets into adistrict known as the.Ashburton Forks. Here the high. rowijrunS for about eight miles through as textile, a. bit of agricultural land as one Will find anywhere in Canterbury. The farmers who are fortunate enough to be settled on this favored spot evidently knew wi»at they were doing when making their selections, and they evidently understand, the nature of the rich bit of soU they have "been Incky enough to get hold of. At anyrate, they can always manage to get heavy rields of either wheat, oats, or barley. There is no journey I have to make that fives mc greater pleasure than a ride hrough, round, or past the farms .of Messrs Isaac Sargent, Pearce, Weldon. Frisby, Mclntyre, Sutheriaid, Good, Church, Anderson, and a few others, and particularly so at this time of the year, or a little later on when the fields are ornamented with stooks of big heavy sheaves of bright-looking grain. It is a small fork of the country in which one can always make pretty sure of seeing fortyfive, fifty, Qfty-tlve, and occasionally up to and over sixty bushel wheat crops, while the oats have frequently gone op to seventy bushels per acre, a*nd even as high as eighty-two. The land is of that kindly nature, and so favorably situated that it will give a good account of itself, through any sort of weather short of hailstorms or howling nor'west winds. Just now the -.district presents a perfect picture, and there are some splendid crops of both •wheat and oats. The average of the wheat crop will scale close on to forty bushels, -while the oats will run five or six bushels above this highly encouraging figure. Under ordinary circumstances the total area under wheat crop this season would have been larger, than in any previous year, but the : heavy rains in the early autumn prevented : n big breadth of winter wheait from being sown, and the same causes militated I against wheatfsowing in the spring, consequently much of the land that was intended for wheat was sown down in oats. Barley is not much sought after, and a couple of thousand acres will about represent the Breadth of this cereal sown clown in the whele county. I have seen a few good crops, but, on the other hand, I have met with some that will not go above fifteen bushels to the acre. I shall, therefore, give the estimated gross produce of this grain at 42,000 bushels, equal to twenty-one Dushels per acre. It may go Blightly over this, and there may be a few, acres over or under the 2000 mentioned, but in giving an approximate estimate it is quite sufficient for all practical purposes to deal with round numbers. The total acreage of wheat will be about 62,000, and the average yield for the entire county amay safely be taken at something, like twenty-six or twenty-seven bushels per acre. Taking the first figures, in order to be •within the mark, and so as to allow a littld for windage, as they say in rifle shooting, the gross bushelage would be 1,612,000 .bushels. If we can manage to supply this trifle of sound wheat, and I think, we shall, Canterbury ought to be satisfied -with the contribution that will come, from the home of shingle, tussock, and waterraces. There is about 40,000 acres in oats, but out of this area there will be some 4000 or 5000 acres cut for chaff, the consumption of which is annually becoming sgreater. The machines started among the green oats more than a fortnight agb, and judging by the quantity I have already, seen cut I should be inclined to consign, the last-mentioned area to the chaff*, cutters. This would leave 35,000 acres for grain, and taking the estimate, at 28 bushels to the acre, the gross produce will be about 980,000 bushels of marketable grain. Ido not think the average for the -whole county will exceed 28 bushels to the. acre, as in many places the oats -were sown late, especially those that are growing on tne land that was originally intended for wheat. To balance some of the patchy crops of both wheat and oats on the good land that suffered from heavy rains and floods, the crops on the light lands never lookedbetter than they do at present, and- instead of pulling down the general average,* the crops " out on the plains" will help to raise it above that of last year. The: only thing that would materially affect -the approximate estimates I have given of the yields of wheat, oats, and barley, -would be an unlucky fulfilment of Mr Marmaduke Dixon's prophesy of an undue prevalence of nor'-west winds. We have another prophesy, and one that goes in a totally opposite direction, the Maoris holding that the prolific blooming of the flax bushes betokens an unusually, wet summer. Between these two predictions I take it there will be a bit of an opening, and the sincere desire I have towards all my farming friends is that they may steer . the ingathering of a rich harvest safely through the aperture, and finally land in ihe haven of a remunerative market.