FRUIT AND PLANT RESEARCH

Northern Advocate, 27 October 1936, Page 6

FRUIT AND PLANT RESEARCH

STATION PLANNED FOR AUCKLAND

t Special to "Nortliera Advocate/’] AUCKLAND, This Day.

An announcement in the Gazette to the effect that the Government intends to take an area of 16 acres 2 roods in the Mount Albert borough under the Public Works Act, 1928, advances a stage further the proposal to establish a plant research station in Auckland under the control of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research.

Dr. G. H. Cunningham, who will be director of the station, states that the rand to be taken will be very suitable, for it contains four soil types—clay, true volcanic, semi-volcanic and rich swamp land. There are no buildings on the area at present, gnd it is mainly in pasture, with* some gorse, while a small section is swamp.

The plans make provision for a twostoreyed laboratory in brick, and it is hoped to start building as soon as possible after the land is acquired.

The station will deal with fruit and plant protection and research and will have a staff of about 18 scientists. The establishment of the station is part of the scheme recommended early this year by a special committee which proposed that the work hitherto performed by the Plant Research Station of the Department of Agriculture at Palmerston North should be reorganised under the control of the Department of Industrial and Scientific Research.

Work on cxups will be continued at Lincoln College, Canterbury, and on grassland research at Massey College. For climatic reasons it has been considered advisable to transfer the fruit and plant research to Auckland, as all classes of plants grown in New Zealand can be grown in the Auckland Province, thus making it possible to have a range of detailed investigations which would not be possible elsewhere in the Dominion. Fruit research will deal with the standardisation of root stock and scions of apples and citrus fruit; the importation and testing of new varieties of fruit and small fruits already in cultivation, and some classes of fruit, sub-tropical and otherwise, which may be suited to New Zealand.

The plant protection work will cover improvements in the control of all diseases and pests, and the use of sprays, dust and fumigants.