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excellently. I would not put one before the other in estimating the 

 fertility or productiveness of the district, because we have a great 

 variety of soils which produce both fruit and cereals to perfection. 

 I would answer to your question that orchards and crops, whether 

 cut for \vheat or hay, never fail, and are very profitable on our rich 

 alluvial Hats. Of the crops that should be avoided, lucerne is one. 

 It does not succeed here, probably because there is not enough 

 lime on the made lands. The soil is also rather too stiff to suit that 

 plant. Moreover, the climate is too dry in summer, when, of course, 

 maize should be grown, to allow us to grow it to advantage. Nor, 

 speaking generally, do potatoes thrive. The strong land is too stiff 

 for them, and the sandy land too poor to yield a heavy crop. There 

 are spots where potatoes do very well, but these are the exception. 

 It is evident that the district is not well suited for potatoes, or pota- 

 toes would be largely grown so near to the metropolitan market, 

 and they are not largely grown. Farmers find out very quickly 

 what they can make the most money out of that is, what will grow 

 best. The experience of the Swan is against potatoes, for the price 

 they realise affords every encouragement to grow them. I do not 

 think they are ever sold at less than 10 per ton. But I should add 

 that when potatoes are grown on the Sw r an they are of remarkably 

 good quality and first-class keepers that is the spring crop. The 

 early rose variety is the kind which thrives best. 



" The land does not quickly exhaust itself not the good land, 

 and the inferior is hardly touched. The rich paddocks have been 

 cropped for many years without the aid of manuring, but they have 

 to some extent been fertilised by the grazing of sheep. Bone dust is 

 now being largely used; it is obtainable at a reasonable rate. A 

 few years before so many large Queensland preserving factories 

 were established, bone dust was very scarce and cost 7 per ton ; it 

 is now ^5 per ton, and of better quality than that which used to be 

 in the market. This fertiliser is creating a revolution in the agricul- 

 tural industry of the district. When artificial manures were not 

 obtainable there was necessarily less production. Yt.u could not 

 get guano, and it does not suit the Swan as well as bone dust. At 

 the time of which I speak the concession under which the Messrs. 

 BroadliurM and Xeil remove guano from the Abmlhos islands had 

 not been granted. The 'live guano,' which was excellent, could 

 only be obtained from Sharks Hay in small quantities, where the 

 its are limited. Bone dust, so far as 1 know, is suitable for a 

 larger variety of soils than guano ; it is quicker in its action. 

 Thomas' phosphates are being largely tried this year, more largely 

 than ever before. 



" Many of the local cultivators are also sheep fanners. They 

 buy store sheep from the north, but the supply of this stock is not 

 equal to the demand. The reasons for this are that during the last 

 ten years people in the south have given up the breeding of sheep 

 and cattle, while drought in the north has reduced the number there 



