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PASSING NOTES.

WOOL EXPORT. The value of wool exported from the colony last year is pub down ab £4,150,599. Twenty years ago it was £1,606,144. We may look for a further expansion of the wool industry as years roll on, unless, indeed, some epidemic breaks out among the flocks, a very improbable event. Sheepowners, however, will have to look after the health of their respective flocks, taking special care that pasturage is sweet and plentiful, a principal factor in successful sheep farming. With the increase of sheep, it is satisfactory to find that the area of grass is increasing, that of turnips also, showing that provision is being made for the increased number of mouths that have to be fed. The increase in the number of sheep" has'not had any effect in lowering the prices of cattle. Ib is reported that in Taranaki prices of some descriptions of stock have gone up 50 per cent. In the Auckland markets cattle are worth more than they were some time ago. At some of the sales calves and young stock have been wanted, but were not forthcoming. TIMBER VERSUS CORN. Under the above heading, in a recent number of the Agricultural Gazette, there is an interesting article, which goes to prove that growing timber may be as profitable or even more so than ordinary farming, or grain growing.., The writer of the article refers to Netherby, formerly the property of Sir James Graham, and now of his successor. The estate, consisting of 26,000 acres, is twelve miles north of Carlisle, the total ' area of plantations being 3500 acres. Twenty acres are planted every year in excess of the area that is annually cleared. Experience has proved that the woodlands at Netherby are more profitable than the same land would be in farming. In fact, these woods have more than held their own as compared with land ; in arable culture, or even in grass on the estate. The trees generally planted are oak, ash, elm, sycamore, Spanish chestnut, and the hardy conifers. The peaty soils are planted with birch and firs, and the best soils with hard-wood timber. The planting is effected in moist weather in" February and March. The methods of planting in use here are inexpensive coinpared with those which have been adopted, sometimes vary unnecessarily, on some estates, where money is wasted in trenching, mi operation which costs usually about £8 per acre. When trenching and the Netherby practice were tried experimentally side by side, it was found that although the plants grew more rapidly in trenched ground for the first fifteen years, the advantage was not maintained, and at the end ; of thirty years no difference existed in the progress of the timber. Trenching, there- I fore, is useless in the case of timber trees, though it may probably be desirable when underwoods for hop poles and hoops are planted in good land worth perhaps a rent of 30s per acre. Planting is effected at Netherby by pitting in the case of hardwood trees, and by notching, or slitting, for conifers having small roots. The pits are dug 12in deep and 12in square, and the young trees are set 3sit apart. This costs £5 an acre, slitting costs less than half as much. In protecting the trees from rabbits it has been found that smearing them with compositions of any kind is injurious. The plantations are therefore surrounded with wire netting 3fb wide and l£in mesh. The returns or profibs commence in about a dozen years, when the thinning of the trees begins, the worst trees being removed to let in light and air. The work of thinning is repeated at intervals of four to five years, until the woods are thirty years old; after which the process of thinning only takes place onee in six or eight years, till the maturity of the plantation at about sixty years old. The receipts from the woodlands have yielded a good annual rent considering the inferior quality of moorland soil, besides fair interest of money on the original outlay. A plantation sixty years old should bo worth, after repeated profitable thinning, £60 per acre. Objections are generally made to timber growing on account of the time that must elapse before any rofcurns are forthcoming; also that planting is purely a speculation, as there might be no market for the timber once it was ready for cutting. Bub to both these objections replies ctiu easily b# Wtt djs From tbo I

; article alluded to, I ' quote the following I interesting remarks about the vahie of timber grown in England, how it has been appreciated, and how in some cases it has lasted :— " As to the quality of homegrown timber, both the English and the Scottish Arboricultural Societies ; have frequently discussed that point, and at a recent meeting of the last-named society some interesting evidence was brought forward. It appears that when home-grown timber can be obtained and is properly selected and seasoned there is no question as to its durability. The panelling of Balmoral and Mar Lodge, and of many ot the best houses in the kingdom, has been effected with home - grown Scotch fir. Ashburnham House, in Sussex, is an example of a modern house panelled and floored throughout with oak from the park. There is; in fact, no timber tougher and more beautifully figured than that of our own country, which, at one time, was, of course, solely* used for all buildings great and smalL "There are many old churches in Sussex and elsewhere the framework of whose steeples is of oak that still remains as sound as it was 600 years ago. The oldest church in England, built before the Conquest, is entirely of wood, grown, no doubt,, In the county of Essex, where the building stands. All the conifers except | the Scotch fir are of foreign origin, and the larch, the most useful of them, has only been in Great Britain 150 years. The Scotch fir is almost as good as the larch, and in the neighbourhood of its native forests in Scotland is used by architects as freely as foreign deal." In the planting of useful timber trees there has been comparatively little done in this colony. The last agricultural returns state that 35,310 acres ol forest trees have been planted, which, divided among the 38,000 holdings, does not average an acre to each. Some of the proprietors of our big estates should follow the example set by the owners of Netherby, and turn parts of their property into woodlands, 'for the benefit of generations to come, and to provide timber For future necessities. * Ageicola.

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Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZH18910729.2.11

Bibliographic details

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8631, 29 July 1891, Page 3

Word Count
1,108

PASSING NOTES. New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8631, 29 July 1891, Page 3

PASSING NOTES. New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8631, 29 July 1891, Page 3