OF NEW ZEALAND INTEREST.

Otago Witness, Issue 3868, 1 May 1928, Page 11

OF NEW ZEALAND INTEREST.

GRASSLANDS OF THE DOMINIONS VISITORS’ TRIBUTE TO CHRISTCHURCH. (From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, March G. A correspondent of the Colne and Nelson Times, who has been travelling in the Southern Hemisphere, gives a very accurate and interesting account of New Zealand to that journal. Of Christchurch he says:— “ It is even claimed to be the best laidout city in the Empire, and it is certainly one of the loveliest garden cities it has been my privilege yet te see. It is laid out in squares, and the streets bear the names of many old Engli.h towns. They are all not less than GGft wide. The River Avon, which runs through the heart of the city, between Oxford and Cambridge terraces, adds charm and beauty of the city with innumerable weeping willow trees on each bank. It is a very popular boating resort. At one point of the river there has been built a Bridge and Arch of Remembrance, which is oue of the finest monuments I have seen to the memory of the fallen in the Great War.”

The writer goes on to speak of the view from the Cashmere Hills : “ Here one has the whole of the city spread out before oue. To the right is New Brighton and the Pacific Ocean, and far away to the north one gets a glimpse of the Kaikoura Mountains. To the west are the suowclad summits of the Southern Alps, and to the south as far as the eye can see are the well-culti-vated farms of the Canterbury Plains, which are the granary of New Zealand as well as the nursery of the worldfamed Canterbury lamb. This panorama, viewed in the evening, resembles one of the scenes pictured in ‘ Arabian Nights,’ for there are multitudes of electric lights of varied colours in the city and suburbs giving it the semblance of a jewelled carpet.” A LITTLE MIXED. The following strange statement is from the important paper, the Birmingham Post: — “ A Press Asspciation message trom Vancouver says that the New Zealand Rugby football team, the Waratahs, in tbeir final game in Canada on Saturday, defeated a representative local team by 17 points to nil. The team will sail for New Zealand on Wednesday.” It is obvious that the sub-editor who filled out the cablegram is not a follower of Rugby football. Perhaps, he has been under the impression that New South Wales was a province of New Zealand. GRASS SWARDS OF THE DOMINION. At a conference on the subject of grasslands held at Aberyswyth, Professor. R. G. S tuple don, M.8.E., M.A., director of the Plant Breeding Station, gave a paper

on “ Some Grassland and Other Lessons from Australia and New Zealand.” He said that Australia and New Zealnd had one oustanding lesson to teach farmers- of this country, and that was the influence of the grazing animal on sward formation, sward, and sward deterioration. Eighty years ago New Zealand was without grazing animals or herbage, but today its stock unit was 71 as compared with 100 of the Mother Country. Intelligence and tenacity had done much for New Zealand and the best swards there were as if lifted bodily from Northamptonshire, except that they were 20 percent. better. Both Australit and New Zealand were wonderful countries, and he would advise everybody to go and see them and never come back.