WESTERN WOLTHS, the extreme annual form of Italian ryegrass (Lolium multiflorum Lam.), is a fodder grass which orginated in the Netherlands (De Haan, 1955). Thirty to forty years ago it was widely used in Canterbury but its use died out with the advent of the certification scheme and the availability of good perennial ryegrass-white clover pastures. Saxby (1956) states that the questionable value of Western Wolths ryegrass has not warranted its inclusion in the certification scheme, and that in 1956 genuine seed was practically non-existent on the New Zealand market.
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(163 KB)THE ABILITY OF PLANTS to capture light energy is the key to the continual survival of all life. Light absorbed by the green parts of plants is used to fix carbon dioxide from the air and convert it into energy-rich compounds which are then translocated to other parts of the plants. There they may be stored or used to provide energy for growth processes with consequent release of carbon dioxide. This energy from sunlight which is stored in biochemical compounds is the only source of energy for growth and is only a small portion of the total incident sunlight. The rate at which plants can take up carbon dioxide is thus a good measure of the rate at which plants absorb useful energy. However, in practice, only the net exchange of carbon dioxide which results from the uptake by photosynthesis and release by respiration can be measured.
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(48 KB)“RED COURT” comprises 977 acres, of which 500 acres is very dry undulating-to-rolling country classified as Becks clay loam, probably some of the best soil in the district for dryland farming. There are 200 acres of Wetherburn soil on the high terraces. The Wetherburn soils are flat with a hard pan or “Maori bottom” about 20 in. below the surface. No moisture can be obtained from below, so lucerne on this country is dependent entirely on rainfall. There are 77 acres of creek channel and swamp and 200 acres of medium-to-light flats known as Ranfurly soils; these are good soils on the low terraces above the Wedderburn stream. They are suitable for hay production, and one cut each season could be expected in three seasons out of four.
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(58 KB)“THE COUNTRY needs overseas funds.” This is a plea that is often heard and is akin to the statements that all drgland needs irrigation, and all farmers Rolls Royces. A logical approach to the subject of overseas funds is to determine what could be done if overseas funds were available and what has got to be sacrificed to obtain them.
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(94 KB)CENTRAL OTAGO has a lore and a lure which set it apart from the rest of New Zealand. Its characteristics of geology, topography and climate, its history of occupation and exploitation, its scenery at once forbidding and yet strangely fascinating-these features combine to cast a spell from which few who have been exposed can ever fully escape. There is no formal boundary to the region. For the purposes of this paper it is defined as the area bounded by the Carrick and Old Man Ranges to the south, by the Lammermoor and Rock and Pillar Ranges to the east, by the Hawkdun and St. Bathans mountains, on the north, and west to Lakes Hawea, Wanaka and Wakatipu.
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(62 KB)MOST ADVISORS of tussock grassland development frequently recommend the sowing of a few pounds of grass seed, usually cocksfoot, with clover seed mixtures for oversowing. With changes taking place in tussock grassland fertility, owing to successful clover growth and more intense grazing, it appears an appropriate time to assess critically the place of grass oversowing and more particularly the emphasis on cocksfoot as the grass to sow in the tussock grassland environment.
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(122 KB)PATEAROA STATION is situated at the south-east end of the Maniototo plain, and runs from the plains level of 1,200 ft at the homestead to a height of 4,700 ft at the top of the Rock and Pillar range. The station comprises 13,000 acres, 700 acres of which is arable, the balance being hill country. The general aspect is north-west, and the district enjoys the doubtful privilege of running Alexandra a very close race for the distinction of being the driest in New Zealand. Over the last 10 years, the annual rainfall has been 13.63 in. and the 50-year average is just over 14 in. per year.
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(43 KB)IT IS WELL KNOWN that the key to pasture improvement in the tussock country of the South Island is in the introduction of high-producing legumes. White, red and alsike clovers have been widely used with considerable success. Lucerne, as yet, is much less important, even though it has been shown by Iversen ( 196.5) that on droughty soils it can produce much more dry matter than conventional pastures. One of the main reasons for the lesser use of lucerne is the difficulty in establishing the plant by surface sowing methods, particularly in acid soils. On the high pH brown-grey earths of Central Otago, lucerne can be sod-seeded into scabweed country quite successfully (Ludecke, 1962) and large areas have been sown by this means. On the more acid yellow-grey and yellow-brown earths, however, with denser plant cover, lucerne is commonly established only by conventional methods of cultivation and broadcast liming, even though there is considerable scope for its extended introduction into droughty situations by cheaper means.
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(85 KB)IN ITS UNIMPROVED STATE, tussock country is often poor and unproductive. Early development of this secondclass country was based on the plough and lime bag.
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(56 KB)MORVEN HILLS is situated 42 miles north-east of Cromwell on the Cromwell-Timaru state highway. The aspect of the country is one-third south-west, and the remainder northeast to north-west. Altitude ranges from 1,500 to 5,500 ft a.s.1. Annual rainfall is approximately 22 in. but appears to be increasing. The area of Morven Hills is 35,000 acres of which 3,500 have been oversown, nearly all with seed as well as super-phosphate.
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(62 KB)IN ADDITION to attending the International Grassland Congress in Finland, I was required under the terms of the Memorial Award to examine the Farm Advisory Services of Britain and the U.S.A.
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(94 KB)THE OFFICIAL LANGUAGE of the Congress was English, which is not generally spoken in Finland. All communications were printed in English, and the whole proceeding was efliciently organized and very successful. There were the usual pre- and post-Congress tours, also very successful. Attendance was 450 with representatives from 42 countries (notable among countries not represented were India, Pakistan and China). More than 230 papers were presented in four concurrent sessions and four plenary sessions, all in the Porthanian Building of the University in Helsinki.
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(25 KB)IN 1958, there was available commercially in Britain and Australia a vacuum silage kit which was expensive and useless. It had one redeeming feature, however. It inspired Jean Doutr-e to work on the vacuum idea, and, in collaboration with George Jowsey, to develop the technique which has captured world-wide interest. It is’ relatively inexpensive for this approach to silage making and is practical. It has the great merit that it can be built into the existing New Zealand silage-making procedures without any modifications to those procedures.
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(85 KB)FOR SUCCESSPUL ESTABLISHMENT Of Oversown ClOVerS On virgin tussock grassland or bracken fern country, inoculalation of the seed has proved beneficial (During et al., 1962; Lowther, 1966).
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(104 KB)CENTRAL OTAGO has often been referred to as the “land of rocks and lizards”, implying that little else is able to survive. This was certainly true once, in the days of heavy rabbit infestation, when any sort of pasture improvement was wellnigh impossible. This situation existed even as late as 195 1, but now, with the rabbit controlled and a better knowledge of grassland improvement and management, stock and pasture are gradually taking over land that was at one time depleted scabweed and bare soil. Of late, great interest has been shown in the potential of New Zealand for farming. This paper considers the potential of Central Otago by reference to the two counties, Vincent and Maniototo, which make up the core of the area, and examines the development methods by which this potential, a tremendous one, is being and will be attained.
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(186 KB)THE PROPERTY to be discussed comprises 4,000 acres-2,000 acres of good and 2,000 acres of light, stony flat. By 1956, the rabbit boards had the rabbit under control and stock numbers had risen from 240 ewes with a low lambing percentage, and clipping five bales of wool, to 600 ewes, 200 hoggets and a wool clip of 18 bales. Lambing percentage was 80.
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(57 KB)THERE has been a large increase in the volume of facts about tussock grassland improvement in the last few years. Although facts are important to the scientist, he is not merely a facts-gatherer. He also makes general statements. In the tradition of Anglo-Saxon logic formulated by John Stuart Mill, the scientist derives these general statements from the facts by the process called induction. Nobel Prizewinner for Medicine, Dr P. B. Medawar, questions this traditional assumption. He claims that “truth takes shape in the mind of the observer: it is his imaginative grasp of what might be true that provides the incentive for finding out, so far as he can what is true.” If this imaginative idea of truth still fits the facts after rigorous testing, then it is a good idea and the facts themselves can be conveniently forgotten. Paradoxically, therefore, the factual burden of a science grows less as a science matures. As a science advances, “particular facts are comprehended within and therefore in a sense annihilated by general statements of steadily increasing explanatory power and compass”.
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(291 KB)IN THIS PAPER it is planned to review research work in Central Otago and the work carried out at Tara Hills High Country Research Station, Omarama, prior to 1966, into the improvement of low altitude tussock country, the utilization of this improved country and the increases in production which can occur. Discussion will mainly be concerned with the improvement of tussock country in areas where the rainfall is greater than 20 in. per annum and where clovers can be introduced by oversowing. Lucerne is the legume suited to areas where the rainfall is less than 20 in.
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(140 KB)RESEARCH has shown that pasture production on soils without earthworms is limited to considerably less than the true potential. Increased production with beneficial earthworms is associated with pronounced changes in the physical and chemical properties of the soil. Infiltration rate is increased, moisture is conserved and the risk of soil erosion is reduced
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(1249 KB)THE rocks and soils of Central Otago have fascinated men for more than 100 years, partly because they are such obvious features of an unusual landscape, but also because both have proved to be a source of wealth. The spectacular but short-lived harvest of gold served to open up the region to men who readily appreciated that the soils could be persuaded to yield much more than just this one, fickle, metallic crop. That their judgement was sound is indicated by the diverse and abundant agriculture flourishing in Central Otago today.
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(352 KB)POSSIBLY one of the more spectacular farming innovations of recent years has been vacuum silage. Encouraged by one of the wettest and most growth-promoting summers in living memory, it captured the imagination of the farming community in West Otago and Southland last season. Eighty-thousand tons of silage were made last summer compared with 3,000 tons in the same area the previous year.
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