29 



Here no doubt the climite most exactly reproduces its 8. 

 Australian home. At Tyger Hoek and Ceres Eoad it 

 comes up everywhere like a weed. In the Government 

 plantation at Ceres Eoad there are some successful in situ 

 sowings and more seed is produced than can be utilized. 

 Formerly imported Australian seed used to cost not less 

 than 5/- per Ib. Now it is sold from the Government seed 

 store at 4d. a pound, the bare cost of collection. It seeds 

 freely at 8 years. 



At Johannesburg, Natal, and other places with summer 

 rains the Pycnantha Wattle does not succeed. 



This wattle, the most valuable of all the tan bark wattles, 

 has been so little grown in South Africa that it may be well 

 to add a short description of the tree as it occurs in 

 Australia. There, its home is South Australia. It is seen at 

 its best on the hills around Adelaide, and (adds Prof. Maiden 

 from whom these detail? are obtained) people should be 

 careful to obtain seed from there. It does not succeed 

 above 2,000 ft. elevation in South Australia and is easily 

 injured by frost. It likes a warm climate and a moderate 

 rainfall. Mr. J. Ednie Brown, the late Conservator of 

 Forests in S. Australia, thus describes the typical form : 

 Height 20 to 25 ft. Diameter 6 to 10 inches. Average 

 life 10 to 12 years. It lives longer in sandy than in clayey 

 soils. It should be stripped from the 6th to the 9th year 

 according to circumstances. Stunted trees from dry loca- 

 lities have a very poor bark, analysing as low as 15 per 

 cent, of tannin. On poor sandy soils the bark averages 

 about 25 per cent, of tannin; on mixed sand and loam 

 from 30 to 40 per cent. Mr. Brown has grown it success- 

 fully with a rainfall as low as 10". Prof. Maiden thus 

 describes a 46 per cent, sample analysed by him : It is 

 smooth, a model of compactness, contains a minimum of 

 fibre and therefore powders splendidly, it is of good colour 

 and an excellent bark in every way. South Australia has 

 practically the monopoly of this bark, and it is a grand 

 heritage the envy of the Eastern colonies. 



Mr. Ednie Brown recommends planting Acacia pycnantha 

 at a distance of 4 to 6 ft. from plant to plant. He assumes 

 1,000 trees per acre to yield (at 10 Ibs. per tree) 5 tons of 

 bark worth 5 per ton. These figures are somewhat lower 



