22 



CHAPTER IV. 



THE SOILS OF TUTIRA PAST AND PRESENT. 



EVERYWHERE on Tutira there lias been spread at one period a carpet of 

 dark matted humus. Immediately beneath it has lain a streak of clean 

 grey pumice grit three or four inches in depth ; beneath that again, 

 dense, slightly greasy beds of packed red sand. On the eastern run 

 there are traces of pale, valueless clay. Such were the primeval soils 

 and subsoils of ancient Tutira. 



The relative poverty of the huge district west and north of Napier 

 is usually but wrongly attributed to the presence of the pumiceous 

 band. Really this shallow layer of grit is of trifling import. The 

 bane of the region, of which Tutira forms a part, are its sheets of 

 packed red sand. 1 



Strata, undisturbed by time and change, are now discoverable only 

 on the tops of tablelands, the backs of the aforementioned combs. No 

 soil from greater heights has ever lodged on them. Owing to poverty 

 and subsequent impossibility of enrichment, also by reason of elevation 

 and exposure, it is likely that scrub and fern only, not forest and bush, 

 have always flourished on their barren wind-swept heights. The original 

 stratification of their soils has remained, therefore, comparatively un- 

 disturbed, undislocated, by root growth of any considerable size. The 

 belief that only low growth has always clothed these arid, wretched tops 

 is confirmed by the absence of a certain scrub manuka (Leptospermum 



1 The surface soil of humus, dust, and pumice grit is described in the Edinburgh analysis 

 as " poor, light, sandy material, containing only 7'2 per cent of organic matter. It contains no 

 phosphate." The subsoil of red sand "consisted mainly of silica, the colouring being due to 

 oxide of iron. No phosphates or potash were present." 



