2nd Progress Report - Part 2

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This transcription is complete

—area. There are some pockets along the river which are very good indeed, the tress comparing favourably with those grown in any other district in the State. There are other trees which are going right off and dying at the tops.

11787. One inspector said that the effect of irrigation was to accelerate the downfall of the orchards when planted on unsuitable soil? -That is so. With regard to what the Government have done to help the industry, I would refer to what is known as the Sun-blush scheme. Under a part of this scheme the applies are put up in 10lb boxes. A meeting of growers was held in Perth to arrive at some means whereby the crop could be disposed of in the State if there was no export. I was responsible for the suggestion as to 10lb cases. I first of all worked out a scheme showing the acreage in bearing, the produce per acre over five years, the average yield per acre, what the exports were and what the home consumption was, and I showed approximately what I thought could be used locally in this way. I also pointed out that 38 per cent of the population of the State was found in the metropolitan area, and suggested that this would be a means on including consumers to purchase apples if they could get them in small lots and take the cases home without opening them. my idea was to encourage the people to acquire the habit of eating apples. The growers considered the project a sufficiently good one to try. I mention this to show that we do take some interest in the business part of the affair as well as in the actual growing of the fruit.

11788. You have had considerable experience with regard to the growing of oranges. What would be the cost of working an acre of oranges each year from season to season? -For cultivation alone the charge has been about £4 per acre, and picking has to be added to that at the rate of about 1s per acre in respect to absentee owners. The question would depend upon the age of the trees and the area of the orchard, the number of cases obtained and the amount of spraying that has to be done.

11789. By the Chairman: What do you think of the estimate given by the growers? It was estimated first of all that it would cost £75 per acre to establish? -That is conservative; it would take all that, especially if the settler had to purchase the land.

11790. The interest on that would be £3 15s. Then there are the working costs, picking and everything; these are put down at from £7 10s to £9 per acre? -Is that cultivating and picking only?

11791. And pruning. -The spraying might be the big item. There would not be too much pruning in the citrus. A settler would be doing all the work on a 10 acre block, say, for something under £100. I think it could be done provided there was not too much fruit to pick. it would depend entirely on the crop. Then there would be the carting to the station. The charge to absentees is, I believe, 1s per case for picking and putting on the train.

11792. Manure was put down at £5 per acre? -One would not buy too much for £5. Blood and bone is about £15 per ton. Bone fertiliser is about £9. That would be good manuring. Potash, of course, cannot be bought.

11793. As a fact these are Harvey estimates and they run from £19 to £20 per acre, total costs. Interest on capital cost is estimated at £3 15s: then there is £9 for working the orchard, £5 for manure and £3 for watering, that is paying the water rate and applying the water to an ungraded orchard? -That estimate omits one big item, the cost of fruit cases, if there is a big crop. Apparently spraying is also omitted.

11974. That was included in the working cost? -Would the working cost include cases too?

11975. I do not think the estimates include empty cases. Do you think those estimates would be reasonable? -Having regard to the cost of an orchard if the grower had to buy the land, the estimate is quite conservative. I think the cost would be more than £75. I have here an approximate estimate which I have run out. (Document handed in.) Fruit cannot be grown under 4s. a case, if labour is employed. A feature frequently lost sight of is this. Figures can be put relative to a small orchard to show that a man is going absolutely bankrupt. But where the small orchardist turns the corner is that he does the whole of the work himself. Suppose there is a net profit of 2s. per case, and a man is on an orchard returning him anything from 200 cases and upwards per acre, and he is doing all the work himself, then he is making from £200 to £350 per annum off the place, and that is just the same as if he, as bread winner, were earning it as salary. The absentee is not on a good wicket in any place that i have seen.

11796. In other words, thew working operator with his family can succeed where an absentee cannot? -That is a fundamental fact. The absentees in this State who are making successes of orchards are very few. On the other hand, the small growers, doing all the labour themselves, who are making successes are quite numerous.

11797. What do you consider is the average yield of our well-established orchards? -It is fairly low. I can give you the extract returns. it is much lower that it ought to be. I know our apples return something like 70. Oranges, which include mandarins, produced in the season 1916-1917, 158-184 bushels, or an average of 89 bushels per acre. That year was also the best year we ever had for apples, the returns going up to 90 bushels per acre.

11798. That makes the average yield of oranges 89 bushels as against apples 90? -Yes. Lemons that year were 161. Lemon trees, of course, bear nearly the whole year round. The trees are very rarely without lemons. Pears were fairly high, 122.

11799. Those yields, of course, do not denote anything very payable? -No; but they are an average yield for the State and the trees would be taken from four years old upwards. In these returns a bearing tree is taken from the time it begins to bear.

11800. By Mr Paynter: What is the average life of a good commercial apple tree in this State? -Any old age; 60,70, or 100 years, as far as I know. There ought to be two or three generations in them if they are on good soil, and always fed. We have in the Warren district pear trees planted in the sixties and doing splendidly this year.

11801. By the Chairman: A question which has been exercising my mind very much is that of apple trees planted on the coastal country. I understand the departmental attitude is to condemn the planting of apple orchards in such localities? -Yes. You must have altitude, and you must get away from the humid conditions of the coast, to do any good with apples. If you had technical knowledge you would only have to look at the trees to see the differ—