102 WHEAT PRODUCTION IN NEW ZEALAND 



Debt was soon contracted, and it is necessary to bear this 

 in mind when considering the events of the eighties. 



A fresh development had commenced in the late 

 ' ' seventies ' ' when the large estates, which had been pro- 

 cured in the early days by the squatters, were devoted 

 to cereal growing. These large estates, formerly used 

 for grazing sheep, were broken up and thousands of acres 

 were sown in wheat. Many attempts were thus made to 

 commence wheat production on a large scale, but it was 

 attended by certain disadvantages, and when prices 

 began to fall, these "bonanza" farms ( the term applied 

 to the large wheat farms of America) offered very small, 

 if any, profits. The exact nature of these disadvan- 

 tages will be indicated later, but it is sufficient to note 

 here that the large estate was the outstanding feature 

 of wheat production for the twenty years succeeding the 

 middle "seventies."* 



The forces, then, which led to the great progress in 

 wheat production after 1870 were mainly the decline in 

 the gold production leaving a surplus of labour and 

 capital for other industries, the high prices of wheat, 

 the disadvantages of sheep farming due to the low prices 

 of mutton and the total lack of demand for such, the 

 suitability of the Canterbury Plains for rapidity and 

 ease of cultivation, and lastly the ambitious borrowing 

 policy of Sir Julius Vogel by which railways were 

 opened up, roads and bridges constructed, and the rate 

 of the general development of the country greatly 

 accelerated. 



*The nature of this expansion is reflected in the movements 

 in the price of agricultural land in Canterbury. For the graph 

 of this given on page 104 I am indebted to Mr. F. E. Callaghan, 

 who recently made an investigation into "The History of Land 

 Values in Canterbury." The outstanding feature of the graph 

 is the rapid rise in the " seventies " culminating in the land 

 boom of 1878. The rise since 1895 must be attributed to the 

 successful introduction of sheep farming, the improved methods 

 of cultivation, the development of mixed farming, and most 

 important of all, the rapid rise in the prices of farm products. 



