ROUND EASTLAND.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 17984, 9 January 1922, Page 6

ROUND EASTLAND.

THE WAIAPU VALLEY. EVILS OF DEFORESTATION. No. m. [BY OUB SPECIAL COMMISSIONER.] There is vory little varioty in tlie coastal scenery of the Eastern Peninsularbays and headlands, beachus and steep grass country, scarred invariably with innumerable slips which tell of rapid erosion. At Ruatoria, or as it is just as often called the Cross Roads or Manutahi, there is a charge, for the place is some miles inland, and in t'<io valley of the Waiapa, the largest river on the peninsula. Hikurangi mountain and its companion Aorangi rise jn bold masses, the former to over 5000 ft. jn height, and in the valley are. extensive flats and terraces. The Waiapu riverbed reminds one of the great glacial streams of Canterbury with its extensive shingle beds, and my companions, Mr. A. N. Perham, of the New Zealand Forestry Department, called my attention to the devastating effects of indiscriminating clearance of timbored country. Ho had pointed frequently to the great bare patches on hillside and spur further back as evidence of waste, but here in the Waiapu district the evidences of destructive erosion were manifest to the most casual observer. This part of the peninsula must at one time have been thickly clad with native bush and exceedingly beautiful, and if the StaSe had been wise in its land settlement policy or had possessed politicians or officials with any idea of the evils of unorganised deforestation it might have been beautiful still and by no means less productive as stock carrying country. The utter and complete clearance of all the bush on the high slopes and in the innumerable gullies and ravines, has undoubtedly altered climatic and physical conditions. The forests and verdure which once covered all'this country acted as reservoir and protection. Now the heavy rain clouds discharge their contents against the naked heights there are sudden downpours, and the waters, rushing unrestrainedly down every slope and hollow, bite deep in tho soft papa S' d other calcareous rocks, turn the once shaded creeks into raging torrents, which gouge out chasms and build fan-liko talus on the lower slopes. The accumulated floods rage into the river beds and eat up the rich flats by the scores of acres. Thousands of acres of rich pasture land must now be destroyed by every heavy rainfall, atod more than pasture, for one cannot travel far or talk with many county councillors or county engineers without recognising the damage done to roads and bridges every year by erosion. Maori Leaseholds.

About Bnatoria, both abovo and below, in the valley of the Waiapu, there are considerable areas of level and undulating land, highly suitable for dairy farming, and the low prices ruling for wopl and mutton in' this country of sheep is turning the of* the local people in this direction. Unfortunately for the industry, which could so markedly increase the wealth and population of this district Maori ownership and leaseholds in large areas for comparatively short terms, stand in the way of subdivision and close settlanent as it stands in the way nearly everywhere in this fertile Eastern Peninsula, and as it stands in the way m other great areas of the North Island. It seems to me that in spite of all that has been said and done with regard to the solution of the Mfiori land problem nothing has yet been doie which adequately gives the pakeha thwi power to settle and use in the best way the surplus areas of native territory, or allows tho Maori people a fair chance to utilise their own lands for their' own benefit I have talked to a good numbor of Maoris during my recent travels along the East Coast about turning the Maori landowners into dairy farmers, and ferSuontly I met with the statement that ie Maoris could not or would not stand the steady strain of dairying work. Even Jlr. Hei, a Maori who has won sucoess as a solicitor in Gisborno, who overcame difficulties in his legal education which would appal many pakehas, iseems to hold this opinion. But the fact of the matter is the Maori has never had a fair trial in this work. If he had been given the individual right to his own holding among a fellowship of Maori dairy farmers, been assisted financially and educationally by the Government, or stimulated by banking and other institutions and had then failed I could understand the argument, but I have seen Maoris succeed at the work in spite of serious drawbacks and after all there are quite a. large number of white men who very quickly tire of dairying and most kinds of regular work. lam sure that if tho Maori landowners were properly organised and helped along practical lines quite a large number would socm be helping to swell the dairying eiports of New Zealand. By Port Awanui.

Mr. G, Kirk met us at Ruatoria and drove us down the Waiapu Valley and across to his picturesque residence at Port Awarnui where, from a lovely garden, we had views of a sea as blue as the Mediterranean and beaches fringed with crimson pohutukawas. Down in a rocky cove ifi the real Port Awanui and bullock waggons were unloading bales of wool that were to be lightered off to a coastal steamer. Wo drove then by way of Tikitiki, crossing the wide boulder-strewn bed and the swift stream of the Waiapu by a really rough ford, which few car drivers would care to tackle. There we saw other evidences of the evils of unrestrained deforestation for the remains of a £20,000 bridge stood useless in the middle of a waste of shingle, and we are Bhown where miles of road were swept away by the 1917 flood. It was an exceptional flood of course,.for 19 inches of rum fell in 24 hours and did enormous damage from which the finances of the county councils have not recovered, but who will doubt that flood and damages would have been much less if the various watercourses in the high country had been left clad in native bush or replanted after burning. It is easy to talk of course after the damage' haa been done, but there ave still great areas of forest-covered hill country to 1 e dealt with, and the experiences of this district should prove an object lesson, particularly in places where areas of rich fiat land are adjacent to high steep hill country, and nowhere more particularly than in tho Urewera, whose swift powerful rivers govern thefj fertile Rangitaiki Plains _ and the productive lowlands of Opotiki.