THE HAURAKI PLAINS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15514, 22 January 1914, Page 9

THE HAURAKI PLAINS.

NEW DAIRYING COUNTRY, & . . or< to SOME RICH PASTURES. .A. COW TO THE ACRE. ™ re ole in No. I. ? lai ■ ro; -. en [by our special COMMISSIONER.] 0 When I first visited the Hauraki Plains, nu almost five years ago, the ■ problem as to whether this great area of level country 0 could be profitably utilised was by no ve means settled. I went over the district ™ just before the first lot of sections were on thrown open to the ballot, and I met quite w ] a large number of landseekers, who were th examining the country for'the purpose of la: seeing whether it was worth their while * applying for a section. Quite a large num- . ber of these men were absolutely con- _ vinced that it was either- impossible to ,th effectively drain the land, or that it would a not be advantageously formed even if the J* drainage scheme proved successful. I remember one or two individuals who were $ particularly pessimistic, and, of course, y( particularly positive in asserting their fa adverse opinions. I wonder what those | c men would. think of the district now 2 for some of the very sections they walked fo over are now richly profitable farms, and fa the selling, value, of the land has in some cases increased over 500 per cent. ■ -It was difficult then, I must acknowledge, to realise what could be done with such land. The only way of exploring the sections was to follow the newly made .. stop banks, or to scramble over the debris ' thrown from the drains, and even then all that one could see were great thickets of tall raupo or manuka, and veritable jungles of. kahikatea bush. . The vast extent of raupo which spread like a field of gigantic green maize over scores of square miles has i disappeared,, and in its place spread fields of grass and clover. ' Where, a few years ago no human being, had ever been stand J farmhouses and milking-sheds. *, The Progress of Settlement. a . Only about one-third of the land within t the boundaries of the Government drainage r area has yet been settled. To be precise, and to quote the latest official report on C tHe subject, "the area of land reclaimed a and settled now amounts to 30,010 acres, n occupied by 199 selectors," and the total * expenditure on the scheme up to the end n of March, 1913, was £137,773 16s 9d. s< Curious people may feel inclined to put I these figures together and estimate the v cost per acre by dividing the total Expenditure' by the acreage reclaimed and set- * tied, but this would give entirely erroneous results, for the expenditure in- n eludes extensive works which affect the 1 whole 90,000 acres, and more than this fl 90,000 acres, for already the drainage 1 operations have affected big areas of land < outside the Government boundaries. Besides this large sums of money have been [ spent on dredges and other plant, which l can' be used for draining swamps in other ' parts of the Dominion. t On my first visit to. the Hauraki Plains i I had to make the journey by launch from f the Thames for there was no road connec- c tion. On my second visit I went by way E of To Aroha.to the southern end of the B district, and was able to ride over, a con- ? siderable extent of country.. On my recent £ visit I drove in from Paeroa, and was able i to make a circular journey by way o! £ Netherton, Turua, Pipiroa, and Kerepeehi 7 by what,-at this time of the year are com- ? paratively good, roads,.'.but which bear marks of being, within the last few weeks 1 veritable quagmires. • ■ ■ ■'•■ •■ \ From Paeroa to Netherton. 1 i Prom Paeroa to Netherton the road lies I through closely settled dairying country, l so thickly settled that one could nearly < define it by the line of cream-cans left : by the factory delivery carts. The road I follows for some distance the route of the J proposed . Paeroa-Pokeno railway, as marked von the Government plans, and ] the cream-cans, the fat stock, and the , vast extent of level land, visible from the road are very sound . arguments. for the earl-- construction of this line. , _I crossed the Waihou River at the ' Te Puke ferry, and was pleased to see that a bridge was being constructed there , to give access to the heart of the Plains. , At present there is no bridge over either the i Piako or the Waihou from near Te Aroha j to the Hauraki Gulf. For nearly 40 miles , , these rivers have to be ferried or forded, j and it is plainly to be seen how great, a i . handicap this is to settlers and settlement, i I Both rivers are .tidal for a considerable i distance, and except at high water the approaches to the one or two punt ferries ; are steep, slippery, mud-banks. The road ■ I took follows approximately the western » bank of the Waihou River, and for many > miles is outside.the Government drainage ■ area, but it is through rich flat land all the way typical of the most productive • dairying country. Little of the land on > either side of the road from Netherton to ■ lurua is as yet fully improved, as a matter of fac' it is only since the drainj age operations of ; the Government commenced that settlement or roads were possible in this locality, and vet houses ' are springing up thick and fast, and t»>c road is actually metalled for nearly the whole of its length. I was curious to know where the gravel used for roadmaking came from, because I knew There were no shingle-bed rivers within reach, but the explanation was simple enough. Scows . bring the material from beaches°in the Hauraki Gulf, and discharge it on the banks of the river at convenient places. There is no doubt about the duality of the land on this side of the Waihou, Where- „ ever there are drains the grass is almost , rankly luxuriant, and the numerous dairy a cows lazily munching their cud beneath '- the willows, testify to the abundance of, s feed. ' r A New District. * This is practically a new, district, at the r most only a year or sc old. The houses are d new, the fences are new, the drains are j new, but it must be producing a large amount of butter-fat already, and bears ! every indication of becoming, more richly lt productive as years go by. One feature i, of this new district struck me as being i, somewhat unique. The milking sheds are { . in some cases finer buildings than the . houses of the farmers. This is much more ' reasonable than it appears, because some 3 of the settlers are young, unmarried men, i- and, in many cases, men taking up new I, land have to make it yield an income a Before they can build themselves the sort r of home they would like. The country looks crude and raw yet but no one can : " doubt its richness, and in a little while, d when the stumps and trunks of the old i- forest trees have been cleared and the r> green pasturage runs down to the edge I e of the river, it will be very much like some of the fat farming country I know ir in south-east Yorkshire and east Lincolni- shire. i 1. Changes at Turua. Turua has changed since I saw it last, l " 12 years ago. Then it was practically « only a timber-milling place, and one could n orjj" get about the country by following the bush tramways. The Messrs. Bagnall Bros, had just started a herd of dairy cows, the first to be ferried over into that district, and, I believe, their friends 5S thought them a little mad to try such a. { venture, but they are milking 220 cows >n now and about them 5000 acres of land a has been cut up into farms of from 20 acres to 100 acres, and practically every a section has been taken up. Turua promises to become quite an important dairying centre. It is surrounded by an immense a - extent of alluvial flats, and several important roads converge here. Already it is taking on quite the air of a prosperous in- village, and the real development of the le district is only just commencing. 39 I believe it was somewhere in the ie vicinity of Turua where Captain. Cook _ ..made his famous landing; and praised the

grandeur of the forest trees, saw the possibilities .of the, broad, river which he named the Thames. He ' little thought then that on the banks of that river men of his own race would. be cutting down those tall kahikateas to make boxes in order to carry butter '. from New Zealand to London. Prom Turua to Pipiroa. From Turua it is only a drive of five or six miles to Pipiroa, on the Piako River. For a mile or two the road passes through old bush country, the great stumps bearing witness to the size of the trees. The land is all taken up on each side of the road, but- in ■ its present state it looks crude, and one has, to see the clovers and grasses growing luxuriantly among the roughage to understand what fills the numerous cream-cans packed on the roadside platforms. When one clears the bush . country there bursts on one a sudden view of. a wide open plain, as level as the proverbial billiardtable, and so far-reaching that one' loses sight of its surface, and can only • measure its boundaries by the ranges to the east and west. Northwards, where one knows, the land merges into the Hauraki Gulf, within a few miles; the land seems to stretch to thesky-linj, and one can see nothing. of the gulf waters, because. the plain is here so low that a stop-bank, merely a few inches above spring tide level, is sufficient to cut off .the view. To the eastward the masts of a scow at anchor in the Waihou River stand out above a mist of heat haze, and westward a pile-driver, and a few shea-like buildings are the only objects in an endless vista of yellow plain. There is the making of a fair -.English county here, the opportunity for reproducing all the best that our race has made for itself in the old land, with something fuller and better than it, ewr knew even in the palmiest days of English farming. ° - ■