CULVERDEN SUBDIVIDED 50 YEARS AGO

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28618, 21 June 1958, Page 9

CULVERDEN SUBDIVIDED 50 YEARS AGO

Three Original Settlers Still On Farms Next Thursday will have a special significance for settlers in the Culverden district. It will be 50 years since members of the Canterbury Land Board gathered in the old Art Gallery in Christchurch to conduct a ballot for 25 of the 29 sections into which the former Culverden estate of the late Sir J. Cracroft Wilson had been subdivided.

The Crown, which had compulsorily acquired 25,155 acres from the trustees in the estate, who were a wardes/-£119,450 for- the land after a hearing in the Compensation Court, put up for selection 25,540 acres of land lying between the Pahau and Waiau rivers

in blocks ranging in size from 228 to 2892 acres. The map of the Culverden Settlement issued by the Commissioner of Crown Lands at that time, with details of the offering, described the country as ranging in /altitude from 570 to 1819 feet and varying in quality from good ' pastoral hills and mixed agricultural and pastoral downs and flats to light stony flats. It was said to be well to the breeding of sheep with a good reputation for its wool, sheep and lambs.

Two (of the men who drew sections of land on that now distant day are still actively farming their land and another is still living on his farm which is now operated by sons. In a number of cases sections are in the hands of relatives of the original selectors. In the year before the estate was broken up Culverden carried slightly under 18,000 sheep. In 1952, the most recent for which detailed/returns of farmers’ sheep numbers are available, the carrying capacity of the 29 farms was 31.417.

If a modest 2 per cent, increase a year is allowed for the years since then the sheep talty by now would have reached more than 35.000 or an increase of 100 per cent, in the 50 years. This may, however, be too conservative an estimate of the present position. Shelter Belts Apart from the appearance of neat well-cared for homesteads, improved pastures and trim fencelines perhaps the most notable change that has taken place in the countryside has been the widespread tree plantings njade by the settlers so that very serviceable shelter belts now crisscross farms which were treeless 50 years ago. Mr Edward one of the original settlers, who though now 77 years old still rises regularly at 5.45 a.m. and takes an active part in the operation of his farm, was working for the Public Works Department on a telephone line at Blind river when he drew section two of 709 acres. Having poisoned rabbits on properties including Molesworth, learnt to shear on Edmund Rutherford’s and fenced with a brother on Flaxbourne for a modest 2s 3d a chain he was well fitted to farm. With a sack, a box, a bicycle and a dog he set out for his new estate travelling by coach, bicycle and then by train to Culverden. The box. which did long service as a chaff box, is still in use as a hen coop. Mr Roberts’s section ran down to the Waiau river and he has given to it the name of Riverside The Hurunui rabbit fence divided the /property, outside the fence there being 329 acres which is sti’l in native grasses and inside 380 acres which four years previously had been ploughed up and regrassed but were in fescue which the sheep did not find much to their liking. Mr Roberts bought his first stock from Barker and Munro at Cheviot. They were wether lambs which he drove across Kaiwara station, the station people having to clear a path for him so that their sheep did not get boxed up with his.

When he got into his stride Riverside carried about 630 sheep, and when he started using superphosphate and some lime about 1925 he raised the carrying capac-,

ity to about 900 and recently he has exceeded 1300, but as elsewhere where, fertility has been raised he has not escaped stock troubles. His first wool clip fetched only £llO in contrast to a return of £4500 in the early 1950 s. His first home was a tiny tworoomed cottage exposed to the elements. Now in every direction there are trees, mainly pinus radiata, affording very valuable shelter. Another man who drew a section in the 1908 ballot is Mr Walter F. Grueber, who still farms nearby Bexhill Pastures. He was born in Tasmania and after coming to New Zealand in 1900 he worked for about a year at Weedons and then on Holme station and Craigmore in South Canterbury before drawing a 561-acre section, on which he lived in -a tent for the first three months. He made his first purchase of stock at a clearing sale at Oxford buying 300 odd ewes for 20s 9d which he drove home to Culverden. Mr Grueber served overseas during World War I and was almost on the point of selling his farm before he left. He is eternally grateful for the supervision of his property undertaken by a board of trustees organised by Mr Duncan Rutherford to look after soldiers’ farms and obviate the. need for them selling out. Mr Grueber, whose farm was one of those cared for by ‘Messrs R. H. Davison and Jack Gallagher, recalls that while serving in far off France Mr Rutherford kept him posted with reports of operations on his farm. When he first came to his farm there was barely enough wood about to boil a billy. Now there are 17 or 18 shelter belts. The flock has grown from about 550 to more than 1000, and thftre is also some cropping, including about 48 acres of wheat this year. Mr Grueber is one of the founders of the Culverden dog trials, and for seven years the trials were held on a hill behind his homestead. Though now 78A years old, he won a second prize, and was placed fourth twice and also filth and sixth in trials at Waikari, Culverden. and Waiau this season, and at each he won the prize for the oldest competitor. Working In District Mr George Henshaw, now aged about 95 years, was working on Pahau Pastures when he drew a 2530-acre block of mainly tussock covered downs in the Culverden ballot. He was born in Papanui. Aerial application of superphosphate at the rate of 25 to 30 tons in the last seven or eight years has virtually doubled the carrying capacity of Kia Ora Downs, which how has about 2500 sheep, including 1600 ewes, and about 100 head of cattle. Here also Mr Henshaw embarked on considerable tree plantings. The property is now run by his sons, David and Thomas.

Other properties which are still in the hands of relatives of original selectors are The Terrace, of 399 acres, which is farmed by Mr E. H. Gallagher, a son of Mrs Edith E. Gallagher; Salix, of 228 acres, which is now farmed by Mr A. G. Black, a brother of the initial selector, Mr Eric A. Black; Auchtercairn, of 607 acres, which is now farmed by Mr R. M. Thomson, a sop of Mr Thomas G. Thomson; and’2lo3 acres Mandamus Downs, now farmed b' r Mr H. F. Hammond, a nephew of Mr Alfred Fisher, who drew th 3 block. Mr D. B. Stevenson, a son of Mr James Stevenson, who was a member of the Canterbury Land Board at the time the estate was cut up, has been farming the 756acre block lying to the east of Culverden township Known as Eskdale for the last 11 years. i