PARCHED AUSTRALIA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18389, 3 May 1923, Page 9

PARCHED AUSTRALIA.

THE DROUGHT CONTINUES. ~ FARMERS SELLING STOCK. [from OUR OWN correspondent. SYDNEY. April 25. The almost* Australia-wide dry conditions that have long prevailed are giving rise to increased anxiety. In many parts of New South Wales it is difficult even . to give away store cattle, and to send them down to the city market at Home- / bush fails in many cases to pay even the freight and selling costs. In South Australia as well as New South . Wales the ordinary railway services are being interfered with in order to meet the growing need for water trains hundreds of .. Which are running daily. . In New South' Wales there has been a 50 per cent, reduction of freight charges for fodder to the stricken areas, starting from Monday of this week. Many grazing people- in the worst areas have disposed of all the- stock that they are unable to longer maintain, and with the money thup obtained jmit on deposit, are merely marking, time on empty properties for the conditions to show a decisive change. The weather' during the past couple of weeks has'' been exasperatingly perverse. On the narrow north coast dairying strip of New South Wales— ribbon about 100 miles broad, lying between .the sea and the great dividing ranges— tip to seven inches have fallen in a few days, and the- falls have penetrated as far south as the city of Sydney, though in much less volume. Yet beyond the range, vast tracts remain as dry as a bone, and even the city catchment area, . -which lies on the south coast watershed, has failed, to benefit at all. This latter consideration has promoted something in the nature of a panic on the Water Board. Hurried investigations are .being carried out with a view to laving a. pipe lino about eight miles from 'the Upper Nepean to one of tho reservoirs as an emergency measure to ward off an absolute water famine which if nothing were done, and no substantial rain fell in the meantime, would occur in less than nine months. The board is also considering extending the already stringent restrictions on the use of. water to shower bath's and other domestic uses. A more hopeful view is that the showeryconditions which still prevail .on parts of tho const will become general.