West Australian (Perth, WA : 1879 - 1954), Tuesday 10 June 1924, page 5


RURAL INTERESTS

DOWN SOUTH-WEST. SETTLEMENTS OF INTEREST. No. 13.

(By "Canmore").

A Profitable Small Holding.

If some of the St. George's-terrace "ex-perts" who decry the policy of putting men on small holdings in the South-West would go and ascertain for themselves

the true facts of the case, they might vary their opinions. If they follow this course I would advise a visit to the pro-perty of Mr. S. J. Moulton, situated about two miles from Bridgetown, and they will see there something which proves beyond doubt that success can be obtained on a small holding. The land is subdivided into many small paddocks of a few acres each, which is the great secret of success in connection with farms of this nature. In 1922, off a field of five acres, which had been treated with a bag of bone-super, to the acre, he har-vested 20 tons of hay, and in 1923 a six-acre paddock yielded 18 tons. He has also a five-acre orchard where the trees are eleven years old, and which has been well worked. The trees bear evidence of this, as they are splendidly grown and highly productive. In the previous year 1,200 cases of fruit was picked from this orchard. Mr. Moulton also started dairying last June, and has several very nice Jersey cows on his farm. He dried off the herd in December, and prior to that month his monthly cheques for cream from the Bunbury butter factory averaged between £20 and £26. Added to this the family were kept in butter and milk, and several neighbours were sup-plied with the latter commodity. The cows were not given any feed other than what they obtained in the fields, which were chiefly under sub. clover.

Another Successful Settler. Five miles out from Bridgetown, on the Manjimup-road, if you turn to the left and travel for some distance along a branch track, it will bring you to the fine residence of Mr. Alfred Cullen. He settled on this land 25 years ago, and mainly by his own labour has developed a farm which is a fine testimony to his abilities and energy. All of the wood-work in connection with his home he at-tended to himself, and the rooms are pan-elled with polished native timbers, the river banksia being prominent among them. He also made all of his furniture, and one could not wish for anything bet-ter. Near the house there is an orch-ard containing 30 acres of export apples and four acres of pears, and Mr. Cullen estimates that his fruit crop next year will give him between 6,000 and 7,000 cases. There are altogether 900 acres in this farm, all of which has been ring-barked, and 150 acres is cleared. Mr. Cullen is a great believer in pig-rais-ing, and runs about 70 head of Berk-shares and Middle Yorkshires. He is convinced, and rightly, too, in my opinion, that to farm successfully pigs must be kept. He grows a big area of field peas for them, and states that although they fatten well on this crop, it is necessary to give a change of diet occasionally. Forty-six of the pigs on the farm at the time of my visit, some of which would turn the scale at 112lb., were to be forwarded to market in a few days, and the oldest of them would then be four months and three weeks, while others would be just four months. Mr. Cullen says that although pigs are a pay-able proposition, they must be kept full, and never allowed to get hungry. The sows also must be well fed when suckling their litters, which is all sound advice. Eight brood sows were feeding in a pad-dock near by, and these, I was informed, were living chiefly, and doing well, on windfall and rejected apples. In most of the orchards throughout this growing centre apples could be seen on the ground under the trees in thousands, but it was not the case on this property. The orch-ard was clear of fallen fruit, and what had not been fed to the pigs were in bags, awaiting their turn. Mr. Cullen is also a strong believer in growing early feed for his sheep, such as rape and oats, and several carefully tilled paddocks were sown in readiness for the first rains.

Manjimup. Before reaching Manjimup the road passes the Balgarup Timber Mills, which is a typical logging settlement with its streets of weatherboard cottages, and there seemed to be plenty of movement there. The country is all carrying heavy timber, most of which is jarrah and karri, and this extends for many miles farther south. Manjimup lies between the Bal-garup and Jarnadup mills, and with group settlements developing in the neighbourhood this centre must grow considerably in importance in course of time. Some of the banks have recog-nised this fact already, and have opened branches there, while the solid nature of the buildings being erected indicates that there is something more permanent behind the settlement than what the forest lands provide. There are many stone buildings in the town, and occasion-ally a tiled roof shows against the dense bank of green foliage provided by the forest lands, which adds to the attrac-tiveness of the settlement. And then, on the rising ground near the recreation reserve is one of the daintiest of churches, designed by Messrs. Bales and Cohen, to be met with in the State. When one looks at this beautiful little structure, and the church at Collie, the fact is appreciated that these archi-tects are introducing a type of buildings into the country districts which must have an influence on the artistic im-provement of rural settlements. At Manjimup (Mr. E. H. Fauckner, the Dis-trict Superintendent of Group Settle-ments over the Manjimup-Northcliffe area, placed his services at our disposal for a run to Northclffe and back,

Through Jarnadup and Pemberton. Near the Jarnadup mills there are three group settlements—25, 8 and 9. The latter is a group composed of ex-lumpers, and last season they had 30 acres under potatoes, but the rain failed for once in a lifetime, and only two tons to the acre was harvested—a very try-ing experience right at the commence-ment of operations. No. 8 Group can show a return of 80 children, which is a record for the State, and here also 30 acres were under potatoes, with the same result. Six miles from Pemberton there are properties on both sides of the road owned by Messrs. P. Collins and P. Kingston, which give a good indication of what may be expected of this class of country when these far Southern groups are developed. Mr. Collins has been growing fruit trees for 14 years on his holding, and his 12 acres of planta-tion are an object lesson in careful work-ing, while on the other side of the road Mr. Kingston has a two-year-old orch-ard, which is full of promise. The country here could not have been seen to worse advantage. The average rain-fall is 48 inches per annum, and during the summer months the settlers generally depend upon a fall of an inch per month, but there had been no rain since Sept-ember, with the exception of two or three light showers. It is through this country that the sweet smelling boronia flourishes in its native state, and giant trees tower above these graceful flower-ing shrubs. Near Pemberton there are the relics of an old flour mill where Mr. Pemberton Walcott grew wheat 50 years ago on the surrounding country and ground the produce into flour; but it was regrettable to find that all this country had gone back to Nature. Mr. Walcott evidently found that it was a class of land totally unsuited for wheat production, and did not proceed with his venture. Pemberton. This town was decked out in its holi-day garb when we passed through on Easter Saturday, and people were pour-ing into the main street from all direc-tions in every form of conveyance, motor trucks forming a very considerable part. It is here that two of the State saw mills are established on the banks of Big Brook, and there is a magnificent area of timber country to work over. There is a big proportion of karri here, and associated with the mills there is an extensive powellising plant for the treatment of railway sleepers and other timber likely to be brought into contact with the ravages of white ants. Just past the town is the farm of Messrs. Thompson Bros., who are dairying in conjunction with their other branches of industry, and it was satisfactory to see that even in this part of the country, where there is usually such a reliable summer rain-fall they have erected a silo. They also go in extensively for the cultivation of root and green summer crops in addition to top-dressing their permanent pas-tures. Wonderful Pear Trees. When Mr. Edward Brockman, a son of one of the first settlers on the Swan,

made his trek South-West in company with Messrs. Pemberton Walcott and D'Courcy Lefroy in search of land, it is said that it was only the flooded condi-tion of the Warren River that stopped him going right through to the Southern Ocean. He pitched his camp on the bank of the stream, and his son, Mr. W. L. Brockman is now living in the old home which was built 60 years ago. At Warren House the parents reared a fam-ily of 11 children, including Mr. Hugh Brockman, of Busselton, and there are signs in the walls of the building which indicate that additions were made to the original structure to meet the require-ments of the growing family. ln the gardens are three pear trees which were grown from pips brought in an envelope from Tasmania 60 years ago by Mr. Holdsworthy, who is still living in the State. Two of these trees, which are of the same variety, are much bigger than the third; the topmost branches are quite 60 feet high, and the trunks have a circumference of 10 feet. Last year Mr. Brockman marketed three tons of fruit from the two trees—a record which should be hard to beat.

The Northcliffe Groups. In motoring through the towns and groups further north I heard several stories about the hope-less condition the people in the Northcliffe Group Area would be in dur-ing the winter, as the road from Pem-berton would be impassable, and these settlers would be cut off from supplies for six months. The position was so bad in fact that the local storekeeper had made arrangements to lay in a suf-ficient stock to meet these difficulties. As a matter of fact, it is one of the best roads in the South-West, and there were about 300 men from the Public Works Department constructing branch roads to the groups during the time of my visit. At that time 14 groups had been formed in the Northcliffe Area, with an average of 20 families on each, and each group had an average of about 40 children, making an approximate total of 1,120 souls. The town site of North-cliffe was surveyed in November last, and when they were submitted to auction in March the average upset price for cor-ner blocks was £18, and for others £16. The highest price paid for a quarter-acre block was £46. The Northcfiffe Trad-ing Co. were the first on the scene with a store, and erected extensive premises, but complaints were made in regard to prices, and another store was opened at Easter. Up to this time some of the settlers sent their orders to the city, but there was no protection for this property at the Pemberton railway station, which is at present the terminus, and a lot of pilfering was taking place. The sur-veys have been made for tbe extension of the railway to Northcliffe, and when this is done the position will be greatly im-proved. A temporary hospital has been established in one of the staff cottages, where Charge Nurse Hedley and Nurse Williams look after the comfort of the sick, but permanent quarters are being erected a little further away from the main town. There have been difficul-ties, too, in regard to meat supplies. I saw a bag of meat arrive on one group which was alive with maggots. This had to be buried, and! it meant no meat for these settlers for three days. An application has now been made to the Lands Department for a special lease of a slaughter house, and then a butcher shop will be erected in the town. At the time of my visit the Northcliffe Trading Co. was bringing 500 loaves of bread a day from Manjimup by motor truck, a distance of 40 miles, but the bricks were then on the ground for the building of a bakery. It will be seen from this that the town is gradually de-veloping, and a lot of the inconveniences associated with pioneering a district will soon be overcome. As these groups have been formed at comparatively recent dates no great progress has yet been made, but there were then about 100 acres cleared ready for the plough. Fifty acres of this were to be sown with sub-clover, and the burr and manure were in readiness. On most of the groups the settlers had their garden plots fenced, and they are supplied with whale guano at a moderate cost for use on their kit-chen gardens. Each group is supplied with a garden plough for breaking up these cultivations, and every settler may obtain wire netting for the establishment of poultry runs.