11 At G., 1919.] Settlement in Districts of Heavy Bainfall. 477 



Accepting the fact that the other disabilities referred to are tihe 

 main factors which limit real progress, all endeavcur sho.ild be centred 

 as long as they exist on adjusting the methods of farming to minimize 

 their effects. If it costs from 25s. to 35s. a ton to cart potatoes 15 miles 

 from a settlement to the station, then efforts should be made to divert the 

 labour expended in producing the potatoes, and particularly the extra- 

 ordinary energy required to cart them to the railway, into some other 

 and more profitable channel. 



Pea5, barley, maize, and potatoes, all of which may be grown in these 

 districts, can be readily converted, for instance, into pork, a highly con- 

 centrated and valuable product wliich furnishes its own means of trans- 

 port. 



The problem of dealing with veiinin, particularly rabbits, is a more 

 difficult one to solve in the case of the struggling pioneer with a limited 

 capital, but there is the danger of h"s sitting down and accepting the 

 pest as soone natural phenomenon, and like the rain or the seasons, 

 beyond the power of man to control. The serious losses to sheep from 

 wild dogs need not occur; if the sheep cannot be yarded at night catt e 

 should be substituted. 



It should go .without saying that, in the face of so many natural 

 difficulties, special pains must be taken to insure the maximum yields 

 from each crop and each head of stock, and each acre of grass. In the 

 case of dairy cows, the culling of the non-productive ones, the breeding 

 of better one3, and the provision of extra feed, particularly concentrates 

 in times cf need, mast be systematically practised. The crops cultivated 

 must be suitable and the soil carefully prepared and manured. Grass 

 paddocks should be carefully sown, renovated, and manured. 



The hill country of Victoria is scattered with these settlements, some^ 

 of them have been settled for many years; some have been opened up 

 within the last decade. Among the settlers are those who have adopted 

 rational methods and those who have not. The latter class are being 

 slowly squeezed out and their al):iiidoned holdings covered with scrub and 

 infested with vermin, and always ready fuel for a bush fire, do not lessen 

 the difficulties of the remainder. Tolmie, in the parishes of Tocmbullup 

 and Dueran, in the nortli-east of Victoria, is a case in point. 



Toi>MiE Settlemp:.nt. — Soils and CLijvr.vTE. 



Tolmie is situated on a broken plateau, right on the hill tops at an 

 elevation of some 2,000 odd feet above Mansfield, and 13 miles 

 distant. There is very little level country in the settlement. The tops 

 of the ridges are capped wath a deep friable volcanic loam. It is 

 highly fertile. Lower down are lighter chocolate loams, and in the 

 valleys and flats are found firm greyish soils overlying oM sandstone. 

 The two friable soils srrow excellent crop« of potatoes, but native grasses 

 do not become established on them as leadilv as on the grey. 



Good summer rains are received and the orass remains green the 

 year round. This is what attracted the earliest settlers, who, during 

 serious droughts" on the wheat lands of the Goulburn Valley ever 40 

 years ago, worked their way up the river in search of feed for stock. The 

 green grass was to them a sign of the prom-sed land. The area wa,s 

 first thrown open for selection after the Kelly outlaws had been sup- 

 pressed. They had friends in the vicinity, and it was desired to intro- 

 duce fresh blood into the communitv. 



