AUSTRALIAN WHEATGROWING

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19015, 10 November 1923, Page 9

AUSTRALIAN WHEATGROWING

INFLUENCE OF RAINFALL. THE PROBLEM DISCUSSED. Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright LONDON, November 9 (Received Nov. 9, at 8 p.m.) A problem of vital importance—a proposal to push Australian wheat-growing beyond the 19in vainbelt—was discussed to-day at the Royal Society in a paper by Sir John Russell, head of the Rothamstead Agricultural Research Station, on the influence of rainfall on wheat yields. Sir John Russell stated that while Sir Napier Shaw in 1905 and Hooker in 1907 found a correlation between the yield of wheat and the previous autumnal rainfall, especially during October, he had found on studying critically the Rothamstead results extending over 70 years that autumn rain was beneficial to ceftain and less deleterious to other plots than rain at other times. Sir John Russell said the differing results were due to the difference between experimental and commercial growing, because in wet autumns the farmers put in crops other than wheal. On a large proportion of the holdings it was not impossible for farmers to adapt their manurial treatment to wet Or dry seasons.—A. and N.Z. Cable.