CONFERENCE ON FRUIT GROWING. 



45 



Act came into force ; the chief industry of the farm was then market 

 gardening, the corn and hay being grown chiefly for the horses. Now 

 the fourteen years' lease is nearly complete, the tenant considers the 

 Market Gardeners' Compensation Act applies to the farm ; the landlord 

 says it does not. The tenant considers, although he has no claim for 

 fruit planted before the Act came into force (January 1896), that he 

 has a right to claim compensation for all fruit planted since January 

 1896, and that it was the intention that such a farm should come under 

 the Act. 



The question occurs as to whether an Act of Parliament overrules 

 a lease, and whether it is necessary that the words calling such a holding 

 a "market garden" should necessarily occur in a lease, when it can be 

 proved that the farm has been used for fruit growing for market con- 

 tinuously for fully thirty years. In the above case, the rent, rates, 

 and high wages of the district are too high for corn and sheep farm- 

 ing, the industry of the neighbourhood being chiefly the growth of 

 fruits, vegetables, and flowers for market, both in the open and under 

 glass. 



Now let us look at fruit-growing from the landowners' side. If a 

 landowner is to be subject to paying compensation for fruit trees and 

 bushes planted, he should in fairness have a voice as to the extent of such 

 planting, and as to whether the position and land are suitable, and he 

 may well require to be safeguarded as to the maximum amount to be 

 allowed per acre, or a lump sum not to exceed a certain amount, also that 

 the land should be kept properly cultivated, and not neglected previous to 

 the end of the lease, for if weeds get among the roots of trees and bushes 

 they are difficult to clear out, and in doing this the plants are disturbed 

 injuriously. 



Again, particularly in a district not devoted to fruit, a landlord must 

 consider whether subsequent tenants are likely to wish to have, and to 

 take care of, the fruit trees and bushes planted. 



There is much uncertainty in fruit growing, of which frost in blossom- 

 ing time is one of the chief causes, doing special harm in valleys liable to 

 mists, and on sites where, either due to aspect or other cause, strong 

 sunshine comes suddenly on to the plantation. I know an orchard that 

 last year produced 1,000 half -bushels of plums, but being on an unfavour- 

 able site and low-lying position, it was caught by the frost very severely 

 at an exceptionally critical time of blossoming this year, and it only pro- 

 duced one peck of plums. Consideration has also to be given to planting 

 suitable and good varieties of fruit, and even when this is done, we have 

 to remember that we live in a time of rapid changes, and what may 

 be popular and successful now may not be so in ten or twenty years' 

 time. 



In concluding this first portion on Land Tenure, I consider : 



1. Every holding in cultivation as a market garden (i.e. growing 

 fruit, vegetables, or flowers for market) at January 1, 1896, should, 

 without controversy, participate in the benefits of the Market Gardeners' 

 Compensation Act. 



2. The cost of a farm lease should be either shared between landlord 

 and tenant, or (as the stipulations in a lease are chiefly to the advantage 



