SOIL SURVEY

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20384, 22 October 1940, Page 6

SOIL SURVEY

GISBORNE DISTRICT FIELD WORK FINISHED SIX MONTHS’ OPERATION After operations extending over more than six months, the field work in connection with a soil survey of the Gisborne land district has been completed by Mr. H. S. Gibbs, of the Soil Survey Division of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. Mr. Gibbs has arranged to leave Gisborne tomnorrow for Wellington. Mr. Gibbs commenced on April 1 by going to the Matakaoa County, and then working down the East Coast to Gisborne, extending his operations to Opotiki and in the Urewera Country to Ruatahuna. The Wairoa County was included in his sphere of operations up to a point previously covered by the Hawke’s Bay survey and including the Mahia Peninsula. In his work Mr. Gibbs was required to classify the soils into types and to take samples of each type. He was also required to plot out the location of the various types of country on a map. He found the country very similar to that of Hawke’s Bay, although there was a greater extent of hills. One of the features of the Gisborne district was the large extent of pumice country extending from the vicinity of Tolaga Bay to as far as Mahia, covering much of the easy country in the district. Now that the field work had been completed, it was the task of the office of the department to make maps and make the information gleaned available to workers interested, allowing the public access to the results, although, with the war in progress, the dissemination of the details might be in a modified form.