POTATO GROWING.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXX, Issue 3582, 23 July 1912, Page 2

POTATO GROWING.

SUCCESS OF A NEW VARIETY

Commenting on potato-growing .n the Willow bridge (South aCnterhury) district, Mr H. K. M'Guwan, the wellknown grower, remarks that some years ago a farmer who planted five acres in potatoes was considered a large grower, and 100 acres for the district in. question was considered quite a large area. This season there are growers of fifty acres each, and some as much as 200 acres each, while the probable area planted for the district will he somewhere about 1000 acres. Of course, this would not be possible were it not- for the machines used for planting, digging, and grading. Even with machinery the work is both laborious and tedious, also the scarcity of men for picking up behind the machines has been a serious matter this season, so much so that some machines were unable to make a start. Each machine takes about IS men, and, there being about 20 machines in the district, it would require some 360 men to fully man these machines. The wages usually paid are Is per hour with a bonus of Is per day to every mail stopping to the end of the job', so when the laborers of the Dominion know that there is an abundance of work at WiHowbridge, po-tato-digging time, there should be quite an influx. Up to last season, Princess Victoria has, says Mr M‘Gowan, been our chief variety. r lhis potato always did better than any other, hut this season there is a new potato in the improved Gamekeeper. This variety only came into the district last season, and is digging phenomenal yields. Several growers are trying Gamekeeper in small areas, and in every case the yield will he from, fifteen tons up to twenty-five ton* per acre. Again, Gamekeeper is a .blighyresistev of the highest merit. In fields where other varieties went down with blight. Gamekeeper was not affected: it also has a distinctive flavor of its own. Undoubtedly we have in last struck the right variety when we tried Gamekeeper, concludes Mr M'Gowan.