Manawatu Daily Times FRIDAY, MAY 11, 1923. THE DELUGE.

Manawatu Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 2643, 11 May 1923, Page 4

Manawatu Daily Times FRIDAY, MAY 11, 1923. THE DELUGE.

Canterbury and Marlborough have been the victims of a calamitous visitation, the full effects of which will not be known for some time to come. Only those who have had personal experience of such floods can picture the desolation and devastation, or can imagine the utter helplessness of the sufferers who have seen homes destroyed, farm lands inundated, stock drowned, and the fruit of years of labour devoured in a singh) night, it is the habit of many to ascribe such visitations, in legal phraseology, to "an act of God," but the recurrence of this disaster promr/s a question as to whether man has not had quite a lot to do, if not with the cause, at least with the effect of the deluge. In the past in North Canterbury the most disastrous floods on record have been clue to the. torrential "nor'-west" rains in the hill country accompanied by melting of the snow in spring and autumn. The "great floods" of 18GS and 1874

seem to have originated in this way. But these present floods are clearly of a more local character, and have been caused by an almost unprecedented rainfall on the fiat country and along the lower courses of the streams. The question naturally arises whether in these districts there exist conditions especially favourable to floods, and this at once indicates the possibility of a connection between these disastrous occurrences and the well-known cosequences of deforestation. The popular impression of the South Island is that it is on the eastern side an almost treeless region. But when Canterbury was first settled there was a large amount of native bush covering the level country north of Christchurch —in the districts about Kaiapoi, Rangiora and Oxford. As the jAuckland "Star" points out, within the Sast sixty years all this native busln has practically disappeared, and the once familiar names of Church Bush, Wood-end, Kowhai Bush, Oxford Bush, are now—except in local traditions^—only a memory. But no one familar with this part of the country can doubt that the extirpation of the bush has tended to facilitate floods, sj'-or in a bad rainy season there is now] nothing to chock the storm-water, or I |to assist in its absorption into the ground; and thus the rainfall, pouring headlong into creeks and streams, speedily chokes the gullies and watercourses and swells the main branches of the rivers beyond their bounds. All this applies even more clearly to the Marlborough district, which was once thickly wooded and where now that the hills from which the rivers flow have been largely stripped of their native vegetation, all the local conditions combine to produce just such consequences as the unfortunate inhabitants of Blenheim and the settlers along the Wairau and the Awatere are now compelled to deplore. The moral in regard to thv reckless dagtructtion of bush along the course of rivers has often been drawn.. It may '

be worth noting that the enormous losses inflicted by floods are not always confined to rural districts. Blenheim is a case in point, and though Christchurch has enjoyed long: immunity, since the far-distant days when the Waimakariri broke southward through its bunks and flooded the plain where the "Cathedral City" now stands, well-informed observers have never failed to realise its precarious position or ceased to fear an inundation far more disastrous than any of its predecessors. Obviously what could be done under these circumstances is to replant the upper courses of these rivers and by means of elaborate defensive works to make the city comparatively safe. Even those usually credited with expert knowledge on such subjects have •hitherto failed to appreciate the true inwardness of the situation; and a remarkable instance of this ignorance or carelessness in high places is supplied aptly enough by another item, in our "news of the floods." An enormous "slip" has occurred near Otarama Avhere the Midland railway enters the hill country, and the damage to the line cannot yet be estimated. But nobody who has seen the country near Paterson's Creek or Staircase gully and noted the clay and shale formations held in position on steep hills-ides only by the overlying trees and shrub, could doubt that the destruction of the native growth of tiniTJer and brushwood would result in landslips on a colossal scale. All these "unfortunate incidents" are object lessons which 'carry an obvious moral with them, but which neither Government nor people as yet seem to see or understand.