Irrigation Farming in Australia. 9 



big holdings, mostly under sheep. Here and there, as at Shepparton, 

 there was some country under wheat, as much of the rich Goulburn 

 valley still is. But the day of the sheep squatter in these richer 

 plains is over. One man cannot now be permitted, in the national 



AUSTRALIAN MERINO 

 STUD SHEEP. 



interest, to hold so much fertile country untilled, for his sheep will 

 thrive and breed farther out where the irrigation farmer cannot go. 

 So the older squatter has been bought out or taxed out of his 

 original holding, and the big scrub-dotted plains, which bore no 

 external indication of the richness they held, were cut up into small 

 farming blocks, and the irrigation canals run through them. Shep- 

 parton, to-day, with irrigation farming, is carrying three times as 

 many sheep as it did in the days when sheep were its only produce. 

 The old-timers' selections in Rodney, west of Shepparton and east 

 of Rochester, and again on the other side of Rochester, have dis- 

 appeared. Here are now all small holdings, changing the entire 

 character of the country. In place of a mustering yard and a sheep 

 paddock is a thriving township, with butter and canning factories 

 to handle the newer and economically wealthier produce, Man has 

 conquered Nature by making his own rivers to run where and as he 

 wants. 



Water is diverted from the Goulburn River, not southwards 

 in the stream's own direction, but north-westerly in accordance with 

 a slighter landfall. About no miles before the Goulburn reaches 

 the Murray a weir is thrown across the tributary stream near the 

 town of Murchison. This weir holds up the water to a height of 

 40 ft., backs up the river for 16 miles, and impounds 900 million 

 cubic feet. The view looking down stream from the top of the 

 weir is attractive and inspiring. To the right branches off a diver- 

 sion channel, which runs for 33 miles to Shepparton area ; in the 

 centre in the deep river bed is the foaming torrent of the river, which 

 has just fallen over the weir; and on the left-hand runs the big and 

 brimming Waranga Channel. This channel is itself as big as a 

 river; it is 131 ft. wide at the top, no ft. at the bottom, 7 ft. deep, 

 and runs for 23 miles to Waranga Basin. 



