WHEATGROWING IN AUSTRALIA. 15 



Again at Mr. G. Laidlaw's farm, " Elm Park," Jindera, Albury, 

 New South Wales, 28 bushels 56 Ibs. were obtained on fallowed land 

 with a rainfall of 752 points. 



With a seasonal distribution of rain wheat can be successfully 

 grown with an average of 10 in. There are growers in country 

 that ten years ago was considered outside the wheat belt, that is, 

 the safe country, who for the last five years have never harvested 

 less than an average of 25 bushels per acre. Yet an average of 

 12 to 15 bushels has proved profitable. 



In Victoria, wheatgrowing can increase fivefold before the 

 whole of the suitable land is brought under the plough. The wheat 

 crop of that State should, if the settlers are forthcoming, within a 

 few years reach 8,000,000 acres, provided that one-third of each 

 farm is regularly cultivated. The area under wheat in 1913-14 was 

 2,786,421 acres, so there is room for thousands of growers yet.. 



In South Australia and in Western Australia there are immense 

 areas, running into millions of acres, which yet remain to be 

 brought under wheat. In Queensland wheatgrowing practically 

 remains to be developed. At present stockraising proves most 

 profitable, but there is no question that in the course of time that 

 State will add immensely to the wheat belt of the Commonwealth. 

 In all the States the usual course has been for wheat to follow 

 stockraising, after the latter have sweetened and improved the 

 soil, making it more compact and suitable for cultivation. In new 

 lands, where the soil has been practically untrodden for ages, it is 

 seldom immediately suitable for the cultivation of wheat, in what 

 later on proved to be ideal wheat districts. Therefore, in such a 

 vast country as Australia, which totals 2,974,581 square miles, it 

 is beyond man's calculations to even estimate what proportion may 

 ultimately come under the plough. 



At the present time, however, it is far from extravagant to 

 say that while Australia is now, roughly, producing 100,000,000 

 bushels of wheat on 10,000,000 acres, it is capable, without improv- 

 ing the average yield, of producing 1,000,000,000 bushels of wheat 

 from 100,000,000 acres. And as the experience of good farms has 

 conclusively demonstrated that the average yield could be much 

 greater than it is at present, with good farming methods, the 

 general use of more suitable varieties of wheat, not to mention the 

 still greater improvement in the breeding of suitable wheats, that 

 yield should certainly be half as much again. Australia therefore 

 stands out as promising to be one of the greatest wheat-producing 

 countries in the world. 



