WELLINGTON AGRICULTURAL NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2664, 5 April 1905, Page 20

WELLINGTON AGRICULTURAL NOTES.

(Fbom Ottb Own Cobbespondent.)

The drought has at last broken up. as it started to rain on Tuesday The night. Since then there has Weather. been a light drizzlo all the

time, with heavy showers at intervals, and as the wind has changed a fe-w points farther north, and it is still! hot and muggy, we are likely to get a further fall. ' Another inch at least ia badly wanted, but what we have had, coming &o steadily, has soaked into the ground, and will do an immense amount of good to. vegetation ; and if the weather keeps mild, with genial showers, we may still get a fair" supply of grass to start the winter with. Stock have not fallen off much during the drought, except in some cases in which! dairymen try to carry too many, and have no water supply. On such farms some very poor cows may be seen. The rain has come too late to save the turnip crop in; the area that has been affected by the dryweather, and so it will be comparatively a failure. As that area is one that usually; has turnips to sell, the want may be felt t(f a certain extent : but as sheep are very scarce, I co not think that will have any effect on the price.

At last wcekV sales, when it looked dry enough, with the possibility^ Sheep. of it continuing so for an-*'" other month, so far as one could tell, sheep showed no signs that they were of less value. The numbers coming: forward now are about what we usually 1 , have during the winter, and the quality is not much to boast of, being largely made, up of dealers' lots, or men who, buying on credit, have to bring them back periodically every three months. Fortunately there ar« not a great many of such men nowadays, as the steady increase in values has enabled them to get on their feet ; but of? course while the world wags there will be always some who can never get any "f° r *, rarder," and we have had some insolvencies for fairly large amounts the last few months, by which the stock auctioneers have ben let in for £2000 or £3000. However, they can stand it, as the auctioneers have been coining money of late. As a. matter of fact, the auctioneering business i§ more affected by the value of stock than. £hg farjnej; <£ jjrodjjcer, as he bat fialy to

fell about one sheep to get the same amount of commission that he would have had to sell three for a year or two back ; and when it .comes to having losses through giving credit, it is largely owing to their not being good judges of character, or putting for■vraTd men of straw to buy from them. •under the rose, so as to increase their business. I heard the opinion expressed the other day about one of our most successful and respected auctioneers that although he iwid. done more than., any others to help the struggling farmers in develoing the> country, you seldom or never see his name as a creditor in an insolvent estate. But taking the good times with the bad, there is not the enormous profits that many imagine, and it seems that the Farmers' "Union has come to that conclusion, as we hear nothing of the subject being 1 brought ■up at their meetings lately ; and in my opinion they are acting wise'y. If the union wants a job, however, I would strongly advise them to take Barmy/ up the subject of rabbits. "Why I return to this pest is the appea-rance of a Press Association telegram from Napier giving llr G. P. Donnelly's views. From what he writes there seems even more cause for alarm than even I (who, some say, have "rabbit-phobia"-) had any idea of. The writer says .that rabbits are spreading all over inland Patea, end also on the Ruahine and Kaweka Ranges, and as I have mentioned in previous notes, they are working 1 their way up from the West Coast along the banks of the Orona and Rangitiki Rivers, and are now up the Oroua as far as the foothills of the Ruahine ; and if they are as plentiful as Mr Donelly says up north, it is only a question of time when we shall have to grapple with the pest in all seriousness. In my experience in the propagating of rabbits, time ejoes not enter, however, as they appear as a pest ail at once, wheore previously they were looked upon rather a.s a desirable adjunct to a property. As I wrote fully on the subject come time ago. I only hope that farmers individualro- and Farnieiß' Unions will take notice of this letter of Mr Donnelly's, and adopt some means to combat the scourge, as they are threatened from ail quarters. Some of the benefits the late drought has caused to be effected may Benefits be mentioned. The first, 01 of the chief, good it has done is Drought. the great impetus it has given to providing a water supply for domestic purposes in towns, and for stock on farms. On farms many methods are being tried with that object in view. The old way is scooping out water holes, or making- a dam across a gully or a small creek, and everyone is, or has been, busy at that, or cleaning- out and enlarging old opes. This work is highly commendable, in so far as impure water is better than uc water at all ; but lam happy to bo able to report that there are- quite a number ■who are dong better, still — thau is, by trying • for an- underground supply. " Some are j sinking wells and raising it either with windlass or windmill; others, again, are . more ambitious, and are expending money J trying to get artesian water. Artesian wells j — when they oan be got at a moderate out- j lay — no doubt are the best ; but the risk of failure is too great, as a general rule, to advocate going to any great expense. lam not referring to that belt of country on ' the Manawatu River below Pialnierston North, as at Long-faurn if you drive a pipe down almost anywhere from 10ft to 30ft you v.ill get a supply of good water, and that artesian area is known to extend across the Or&ua River as high as Campbelltown, or Rongotea, as it is now called. Good supplies ha-vc also been got in Wanganui, i and also at Turakina, bat there they have ■ to drive veiy de&p. I saw it reported the other day that the depth of the Turakina bore was only 375 ft; but I think that is a mistake, as at the time it was put down I was interested in the subject, and I got a copy of the strata passed through, with the depth of each particular strata; and my impression is that it totalled up to 506 ft, ! tut I cannot put my hands on the paper , at this moment. However, they got a good supply. I know of another try that was made near tho banks of the Rangitikei, , near where the railway crosses at Kakariki. ' Thsy wont down^496ft, when they lo~t the jumper of the rods, and as they "could not pick it up. the bore had to be abandoned, I after spending- between £400 and £500. In 1 that bore water was stritck several times ■ down to 350 ft, hut it would not ri=e nearer the surface than 60ft. They also tried in the town of Feildingr, but the.v did not persevere to any great depth. I hive just Jieard oi ono farmer about midway between Feilding and Palmerston North, who is now down over 300 ft. I must look him up. as I still take an interest in artesian wells, as they have been the salvation of large tracts of country in Northern Australia. On. this coast the geological formation appears to be so erratic that no dependence can be placed on what different stratas may be got within a few feet, so that if artesian water Is not procurable under 100 ft, I should put, down a, pump and erect a windmill, as over a large extent of country water is to foe had under 60ft'. During the dry weather some of the progressive men in Marton went round v.-ith the hat with the object of collecting £300 to put down a bore to supply the town with water. The day before tho ram came they had sttcreeded in getting ■S&?\ which is "tery gcod for a small place;

but now that rain has fallen and the tanks are replenished, I fear they will have a harder job to get the balance of £12 than they had to get th & £288. £300 was what they reckoned should be provided before they made a start. The promoter went the right way to work by getting the money in hand first. I hope they will succeed, as. if they get water in the town it will give encouragement to the farmers on the plateau of which. Marion is the centre, which is 461 ft above sea level, and has a radius of from. 10 to 15 miles, which is comparatively level, and l over which the farmers have to depend to a large extent on dams or waterholes, as there are no creeks, except one. of any consequence, so that if they should get artesian water it would enhance thevalue of the farm lands greatly. Looking at the surroundings, however, I fear very much that they have not much chance, as, taking! the sea level, Turakina, 10 miles disi tant, is 403 ft lower, and Kakariki, to the south, is 218 ft lower; and to the west the sea is about 15 mi'es away ; but, underground water does not follow surface levels, so that there may be a chance of their being rewarded for their enterprise. I have Seen some curious instances in wellsinking, and one just comes to mind. In the back-blooks of the Darling, a neighbour of ours had spent some £5000 or £6000 in well-sinking, and had not succeeded in finding any water but what was nearly as salt as the sea, and he was jusi. about throwing the station up in disgust. Ho could never express himself without using strong language, but he said to me : "I have sunk a well wherever I thought at all likely, and when anyone came along, from the Commissioner of Crown Lands to the swagman on the track, if they suggested any place, I put a hole down, with always tho same result — salt, water. Not liking: to give in, and perhaps someone- taiins* up the country and succeeding where I had failed. I determined to -try the most unlikely places, and as a start picked the highest sand ridge on the place, and when I took the well-sinker out and showed them where I wanted the hole put down, right on ioi> of the ridge, they thought I had got the 'Darling pea' (that is. gone mad) ; but, to humour me. they went to work, and I left them at it, although I had no hopes, but I meant to see if the result would be the same — salt water. However, to everyone's sururiso, at 200 ft th&v srot a large supply of fairly good water." For years I havo seen from '15J000 to 20.000 sheep watered at that well. After thai; there were plenty of wells sunk in the pine ridges, but few of them turned out such a success. Since then, now 30 years ago. I never discourage anyone who takes a fancy to a place to sink for water : so I hope the Marton folk will succeed, and everyone else that is trying for an underground supply of pure water, as everyone who nrovidos a gallon of pure water is more of a benefactor [ to his country than even he who makes two . blades of grass arrow in nVice of one — in that, unde-rcrrouncl water is our only hope to thoi'ouehly eradicate the microbes that ! infest our flecks. AXTIQU.4 OVIS.