DROUGHT RAVAGES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22922, 28 December 1937, Page 10

DROUGHT RAVAGES

INTERIOR AUSTRALIA HUGE LOSSES OF SHEEP SETTLERS* HOPELESS PLIGHT The ravages of drought in the northern interior of .Australia and huge losses suffered by sheep station owners through yeaVs of little or no rain were vividly described by Mr. W. W. Wicker, a shearing contractor from Winton, 367 miles inland from Townsville, who arrived at Auckland by the Niagara from Sydney yesterday. Accompanied by .his wife, Mr. Wicker is spending a holiday in the Dominion. Though so far north and in the interior, Winton had lost some of its isolation, as it was on the main air route of the Qantas airmail service, said Mr. Wicker. The McMaster family were prominent station owners in the district and one of them, a returned soldier, pioneered the Qantas air service and was now its director. Farmers' Urgent Need "This year the rainfall has been very patchy," Mr. Wicker said. "Early in February 16in. of rain'fell, but now we are badly off for feed. We need lain urgently now. In fact we have not had a proper wet season since about 1924 or 1925, and it is only the herbage that has made it possible to keep stock alive.

Artesian and. sub-arteeian bores abounded in the North, Mr. Wicker continued, and in some places their depth extended to 4000 or 5000 feet. At Winton there was a bore with a depth of 2400 ft. and when the water reached the surface it was within seven degrees of boiling point. About 250,000 gallons of water was supplied from this bore in a day and it was gradually receding. No Rain for Seven Years "One of the peculiar features of the droughts in the North is that there is never anything to show that it will rain," said Mr. Wicker. "There is one place north of Winton where no rain was seen for seven years, so the stories of the reaction of the children «who saw rain for the first time when they were about seven years old can be well understood."

The plight of many of the settlers was hopeless, Mr. Wicker added, and the\ T considered it an impossibility for them to recover in some places. The Government had had to come to their aid and many were receiving a "dole" just to live on the properties, sometimes without any stock. The lot of the New Zealand farmer was an easy one compared with that of settlers in the far North. One man with 26,000 sheep had to kill 4000 of them "off the shears,*' to allow more feed for the others. Then came cold rain which killed more sheep until there were about only 10,000 left.