Ferdinand von Mueller

1

Letter not found. The text given here, B65.12.05, is from the report of the meeting of the Council of the Acclimatisation Society of Victoria held on 5 December 1865 (Argus, 7 December 1865, p. 6). The news item also includes a letter from Edward Curr to the President of the Society on 'the principles acknowledged by all breeders of animals, which are necessary for our society to bear in mind in carrying out the business of acclimatisation as regards the domestication of new animals'.

After Curr's and M's letters were read, Curr moved and M seconded a motion: 'That the Chief Secretary be requested to make some reserves for the use of the Acclimatisation Society, and that it be explained to him that the society will have better chances of success in the domestication of new animals if reserves are made on which to depasture them'. The motion was unanimously carried.

Melbourne Botanic-gardens,

Dec 4 1885,

Gentlemen,-

At the last meeting of the Acclimatisation Council, measures were initiated by Mr. Curr to secure for the location of imported animals of economic or pastoral value, land reserves in such spots as seem to afford the best physical and climatic conditions for their naturalization and multiplication. The proposition brought forward by Mr. Curr I felt great pleasure to support. Indeed, ever since the introduction of animals of especial utility became a measure supported by the state, I have been one of those who advocated the dispersion of our herds and flocks to localities most promising for their prosperity. I may instance this in reference to the llamas, alpacas, and angoras, pointing out repeatedly how these and other flocks might find a home in many of our higher and drier mountain regions, where ordinary pasture animals would permanently not prosper, and where large tracts of country are consequently lying dormant for pastoral pursuits. In now addressing the council, I am anxious to remark that I have entered into some preliminary arrangements for securing land for tests on the growth of various plants of economic or commercial value in spots showing the very different climatic conditions favourable to different plants worthy to be subjected to experiment. Four principal climatic regions distinct from those here generally considered arable, present themselves in Victoria for culture. 1, The fern-tree gullies, with the surrounding moist forests — localities very extensive, often as yet not so readily accessible to traffic as to render other but select crops remunerative, where Peruvian bark trees are likely to prosper, and the Chinese tea shrub, with many other plants delighting in an equable mild humid atmosphere, could be grown with greater advantage than elsewhere in Victoria. 2. The Murray Valley, which to some extent might be regarded as a cotton country, where in sheltered localities during the warm and dry autumn, cotton will advance to maturity, and where other plants of the drier parts of the warm zone would find a more lasting abode than further south. 3. The palm-tree country of East Gipps Land, in which the corypha palm attains a height of eighty feet — a tract of country with its adjacent dense humid forest valleys corresponding to the cedar brushes of New South Wales, and in which unquestionably many sub tropical products could be reared. 4. Our sub alpine regions, in which the plants of the coldest zone would find their natural home, and on the ascent to which, as suggested by the hon. the Minister of the Mining Department and the surveyor general, the degree of hardiness also of some ordinary cereals and culinary vegetables may be tested for the benefit of the local mining populations, and where gradually, at different elevations, less hardy plants could more and more be acclimatised.

Positive arrangements for the establishment of experimental gardens in those climatic centres have been entered into as yet only in reference to the fern regions, the formation and maintenance of special gardens at isolated and distant localities lying beyond the ordinary resources of the department under my control. But land has been selected for cinchona culture in the fern-tree gullies of Mount Macedon. This plant, among all as yet not extensively drawn into cultivation in this country, promises to be one of the most important, and should it prove hardy, as my experiments at the Botanic-gardens, instituted during the last two years, would lead me to expect, it would beyond doubt prove highly remunerative. At least, the cinchona plantations in the Nellgherry hills,

2

India.

after but a few years' existence, are calculated to realize already this year a very lucrative interest on the large capital invested in their formation. To the importance of this subject I drew public attention more than eight years ago, as may be noted by the following quotation from the Transactions of the Royal Society of Victoria (vol. ii., 105)

3

Transactions of the Philosophical Institute of Victoria at that time: see B58.05.02, p. 103. M slightly misquotes the text of his 1858 paper, and the page number in the printed version of the letter is erroneous.

:- 'Some of the cinchona, or Peruvian bark trees, occur on the slopes of the Andes, under a mean temperature little exceeding that of Port Phillip, and are ascending to an elevation of 10,000 feet; their introduction to favourable humid spots of this colony will probably, therefore, not be attended with great difficulty.' Great facilities may arise, through the liberality of the Governments of Bengal, Madras, and Ceylon, for raising large numbers of cinchona plants in this colony, the plants in the Indian mountains having commenced during this year bearing seeds; hence we need probably no longer rely on the costly and precarious process of importing young living specimens of these most useful trees, and depend on their comparatively slow multiplication by layers and cuttings from a small original stock.

In bringing this subject at some length under the notice of the Acclimatisation Council, it is my principal aim to point out, that probably the establishment of reserves for the breeding of select animals new to this country, on spots climatically most distinct in this colony, and the formation of experimental gardens, such as I indicated, might be facilitated and strengthened by mutual co-operation of the Acclimatisation Society and the establishment entrusted to my administration. For, evidently, the surveillance of these pastoral depôts, and these experimental plantations of larger dimensions, would be rendered more easy, more effective, and less expensive, by reciprocal aid in all such localities as would serve simultaneously for trials on the naturalization of both plants and animals. The Acclimatisation Society possesses occasionally facilities to locate flocks on pastoral runs, under the care of friends favourable to the society's pursuits; so also I have availed myself of opportunities to transfer plants of eminent utility, which I imported, to private gardens in localities with a clime more genial to their growth than that of Melbourne. Still, the time has arrived when these experiments might be carried out with advantage more methodically, and on a larger scale. The expenditure involved in the formation of four experimental plantations will probably not exceed £200 each for the first year, when fencing; building of a hut, ploughing and trenching, and also obtaining of tools have to be effected. The outlay for sustaining each plantation subsequently would probably amount annually to £100, the services of an intelligent labourer being continually required at each plantation. Considering that in all probability great practical results will arise from this measure, and additional resources of wealth, and means of prosperous employment be gained, I have felt justified in bringing my proposition under the consideration of the Government,

4

In M's Annual Report, B65.10.01 (in this edition as 65-09-30). The proposal had been further elaborated in M to J. McCulloch, 30 November 1865.

especially as likewise further tests on the relative value and fitness of a number of different trees under different climatic and geologic conditions for forest culture can be combined with the primary object, experiments in this direction having hitherto only been carried on extensively near the metropolis.

If a combination of our efforts is regarded desirable by the Council of the Acclimatisation Society, nothing shall be left undone In my special establishment to speed action, facilitate our labours, and to secure success.