Qualifiers For Ploughing

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31340, 10 April 1967, Page 3

Qualifiers For Ploughing

At a match at Tuahiwi on Saturday two more men qualified to plough in the New Zealand championships in the Prebble-ton-Broadfield district on May 11.

The event was a joint one organised by the North Canterbury Ploughing Match Association and the North Canterbury Young Farmers’ Club. The man who won the match was 28-year-old M. B. Davison, of Rolleston. He will

be ploughing in a New Zealand championship for the first time. Davison, who farms a 400acre property at Rolleston in partnership with his father, Mr P. L. Davison, began match ploughing about six years ago and first competed in a qualifying event for the Atlantic i Silver Plough last year when ! he gained two third placings. In qualifying events this i year he has been fourth twice, i Other Attempts ’ J. R. Brown, a veteran ploughman who comes from • Te Hapu on the west coast of . the far north of the South I Island, gained second place and will also qualify to plough again in a New Zealand final. He has so far missed only one since these events began in 1956.

In 1962 he was runner-up in the national final at Invercargill and in the following year at Rotorua he was third. Before going to Nelson Mr Brown was a farmer and agricultural contractor at Westerfield in Mid-Canterbury. One of the competitors on

Saturday came from Blackball on the West Coast. The judges were Messrs J. G. Carter (Templeton), J. T. Wyllie (Amberley) and J. C, Brooker (Loburn). Soil Dry The judges all agreed that the soil was far too dry. It could have done with another two inches of rain, said Mr Wyllie, although there had been some rain over the weekend. The match was held on the property of Mr L. H. Power. The paddock had been fin wheat and the stubble had been burnt off. Placings were: M. Davison, 159 points 1; J. R. Brown, 154 2/3rd, 2; G. Carter (Greenpark), 145 2/3rd, 3; I. Winter and A. R. Johnston (Rakaia), 138 l/3rd, equal 4.

In another qualifying event at Hilton in the Geraldine district last week another two men were selected to plough in the New Zealand final. They were D. Brown, of Milford, who won the match, and W. Winter, of Swannanoa, who was second.