No Longer Lean And Hungry’
The pumice lands in the centre of the North Island, where the great pine plantations are located, are among New Zealand’s economic assets. But this was not always so.
In the fourteenth century when the famous Arawa explorer, Hatapatu, visited the central plateau he found few birds to hunt. Most of them were a thin, scraggy lot, reflecting, as it were, the poor nature of the land.
So Hatapatu riamed the territory “Tokoroa” or “lean and hungry land.” The pumice lands were much the same in the early part of the twentieth century.
Millions of pine trees were planted in areas on the broad pumice plateau which had been looked upon as useless for farming.
In time it was found that the radiata pine tree grew much faster on the once spurned pumice lands than anywhere else—even its native habitat, California.
Ten feet high in a few years I Often more than 120 ft high in less than 20 years. No longer can the Tokoroa lands be called “lean and hungry.”
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19650430.2.193
Bibliographic details
Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30738, 30 April 1965, Page 15
Word Count
176No Longer Lean And Hungry’ Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30738, 30 April 1965, Page 15
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Acknowledgements
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