Merits Of The Corriedale

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31321, 17 March 1967, Page 15

Merits Of The Corriedale

In a message marking the jubilee show, the president of the Hawarden Agricultural and Pastoral Association said that as a farming district, Hawarden and the surrounding area had made a valuable contribution to agriculture.

The district’s early studmasters had developed the Corriedale to suit local conditions, and while this breed was small numerically, it had achieved international recognition. Bearing in mind its numbers in New Zealand, the Corriedale was probably the leading breed for sales of livestock made overseas. At a time of economic recession, the district’s farmers were probably in an enviable position, because the buyers of wool were showing a decided preference for finewool. While the district could not, like many other parts of

New Zealand, boast high carrying capacities per acre, it could boast a quality product which was standig it in very good stead at a time when buyers were being very selective. Hawarden’s standing as a nucleas area for stud stock for other parts of the world was well-known. Only recently, the district had supplied sheep for Peru and the Argentine. Livestock exports had not only been confined to stud sheep, but several large shipments of flock Corriedales had been exported since the war to countries including North America, South America, Kenya and China. Mr Barker said the jubilee show should be one of the best to have been conducted at Hawarden. He congratulated the Hawarden-Walkari Young Farmers’ Club for its

i efforts to stage a display of , vintage machinery, and to the • district women’s institute i for organising an exhibition : of antiques. Mr Barker said he was pleased that beef cattle i breeders in Hawarden and : surrounding districts had I given some support to a new ■ section for beef cattle. At a ■ time when cattle were being i advocated as a valuable adjunct to sheep in the hill country, the showing of beef breeds should be well worth- ■ while to the exhibitors. He ; expressed the hope that this section would receive increasing support in future. Mr Barker runs a hill country property at Scargill. Known as Inverloch, it is devoted to fine-wool production and the sale of surplus store sheep. It also has a growing herd of Beef Shorthorn breeding cows.