ASHBURTON FARM NOTES.

Press, Volume LIII, Issue 9315, 16 January 1896, Page 2

ASHBURTON FARM NOTES.

» Our agricultural correspondent writes :— " Never since the first bushel of grain was sown in the Ashburton district had the prospects of an abundant harvest been brighter than they were up to Saturday lost, when a furious nor'-wester raged for several hours, unquestionably doing a lot of damago to the standing corn. The wind was followed by a heavy rain storm in the evening, but fortunately tho rain cams down straight as an arrow, and so far from increasing the damago it had; a most beneficial effect, both in cooling the atmosphere, and in moistening the j parched up surface of the soil. Heavy thunder showers hovered and fell over various portions of the district on Sunday, the weather being again very boisterous on Monday, and at the time of writing a stormy nor'-easter is sweeping over the did : . trict. As many of the cereal crops are un-* usually long in the straw and heavy in the ' head, they will go down in places before the boisterous winds, but it is sincerely to be hoped that the damage done will neither be serious nor: general. An Australian farmer paid a flying visit to Longbeach on Friday last, and afterwards expressed himself to mc as fairly astonished at the magnificent. i crops of wheat, oats, barley, rape and/ i turnips he saw, and also at the apparent highly productive natureof our soil generally;/ He was charmed with our climate and thought the weather experienced on New Year's Day was simply delightfully genial—Ashburton j residents thought it was roastingly-hot» After my casual acquaintance had returned' from Longbeach,- I travelled with him through the lightest portions of the Dromore, S Chertsey, and Rakaia districts, and he could scarcely realise that what I" described aa being light and medium land should,-bo yielding such an abundance of pasture and such promising looking cereal crops. That every farm and nearly every village settloV ment holding Bhould bo supplied with constant streams ot water all the year round ■ seemed to him almost incomprehensible, and when I explained to him our system of water-races, the number of miles we had, and how cheaply they had been he could scarcely credit it, the state of affairs was so entirely different, and so com- '. plotely more favourable than that prevailing*' in droughty Australia. Himßelf a farmor'; in a large way, and one who took a keenly intelligent interest in everything pertaining to farming, he thought from what he hacr seen of Now Zealand from the Bluff;to' Christchurch, that it was a highly favoured and delightful colony. Our journey together.-,~ terminated at Rakaia, and I regretted ' much I could not have taken him downwind , introduced him to Mr Wm. Allan, wh(£l - feel sure, would have been delighted to Have • driven him over the Acton Estate, arid ,| shown himthe "general scheme of irrigation ' on that well-managed property. » I should further liked to have shown.my.' Australian friend the country down the- . Beach road from the town of Ashburton, and from thence through the cream of the ( Wakanui district, where heijwould have sceii' a lot of really magnificent cer.eal crops.. 1 1 was that way myself last week, and it was most delightful to see field after field of 4 wheat, .oats and barley, all looking' uriv*' ," commonly well, and promising heavy yields. Mr A. Letham has some magnificent crops 'j of wheat and oats, and so has Mr J. -/■ Bonifant, Mr J. Choak, Mr Jas. Cochrane,^ *r:, Mr W. Brown, Mr Sam Brown, the MajorsV.-vj Wilson, Mr Isaac Thompson, and a number ",.j, of others. Mr Choak has a crop of l " ;S* chevalier barley which, if it stand| },', up, will go close on seventy bushels to the t v acre. At the time of my visit it was look- ,' ing very promising. It was standing froutf "~ 4ft 6in to sft high, with unusually long» .-.- nicely filled heads, and beautifully even all .. over the eighteen acres. Close by was ft' *-:■ very heavy crop of oats, and over the hedge --'; -|, again were several paddocks of wheat, ,# which were promising yields of from tottf'-r/ -$ five to fifty bushels per acre. Mr Choak's l-f----neighbour, Mr Butterick, has also some;,-,;. very heavy crops of both wheat and oats, ,',' and the same may be said of Mr E. Thomas, y jV;. and numbers of others down that way. «;..}. Certainly the whole district never looked./- £*> better, and it will indeed be a pity if the "!•'j£ high wind should continue or in any way '"; jj blight the hopes of the farmers. ,if