A PIONEER'S MEMORIES

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21978, 30 December 1936, Page 10

A PIONEER'S MEMORIES

* — HARD TIMES FOR FARMERS HIGH WINDS AND FLOODS A period of hardship for farmers during whicn they were paid 2s a bushel for wheat, 9d to Is 3d a bushel for oats, 4d per lb for butter, and 6d for a dozen eggs, is still a lively memory of Mr John Sutherland, one of Canterbury's pioneers. Mr Sutherland recounted some of his experiences to a representative of "The Press" yesterday. He came out to New Zealand from Caithness, Scotland, as a young child in 1860, and with the exception of a trip to Sidney he has not left New Zealand since his arrival. Mr Sutherland remembers being carried along the Bridle Track over the Port Hills, while hb family's luggage was brought in on the Heathcote ferry. His parents settled on the Mount Grey Downs-Sefton district, where he lived from 1864 '„o 1910. He took over the farm in 1876, on the death of his father. He wag the eldest of a family of nine children. Mr Sutherland said he remembered particularly clearly the flood of 1888, during which time logs of wood had to be steered through the bar of a hotel at Saltwater Creek, and sheep and cattle were swept away. The weather was a very important factor in farming last century, and Mr Sutherland remembers its different phases very clearly. The northwesterly winds were often of terrific strength, he said, and would sometimes blow tussccl:s right out of the ground.