Ledgers and landscapes: Indicators of rural landscape change in southern New Zealand, 1878–1919

Abstract

Our objective was to develop and calibrate numerical measures to represent the timing and magnitude of landscape change between 1878, and 1919 using information in a stock and station agency's ledgers. Relative expenditures on fencing materials peaked in the 1880s, were lowest in the early 1900s, and rose to one-fifth of annual expenditures from 1914 onwards. In contrast, relative expenditures on soil preparation, cropping and harvesting grew steadily after 1879, peaked in 1900, and declined from then until 1919. This research found that periods of intensive landscape investment between 1878 and 1919 were separated by longer intervals of landscape maintenance.

Agents of landscape change in southern New Zealand, 1896–1920

“…Holland and Olson () suggested that information from stock and station company ledgers may permit a nuanced account of rural landscape change over intervals of a decade or less. They found a large spike in expenditures on farm implements – in this case almost exclusively for mechanical harvesters – in 1879 when the wheat boom in Canterbury was underway: one of the major phases of landscape change in the open country of the South Island at that time.…”

“…We subsequently traced another two personal ledgers kept by LMA (Dunedin) that allowed us to fill gaps in the record for the period between 1901 and 1905 (Holland and Olson ), and Figure shows the complete run of values between 1901 and 1915, the period covered by the WS (Invercargill) ledgers. Although their net effect was minor, the amendments ensure consistency and stronger interpretations.…”

“…During the First World War, farm production was sustained but investment in new capital items was small and labour too scarce for changes to the rural landscape. While a few landholders bought expensive items, the LMA (Dunedin) ledgers show the majority of landholders buying spare parts to keep implements in operation (Holland and Olson ). Draught horses remained the principal source of motive power, although contractors and a few landholders had bought stationery or mobile steam engines to drive threshing mills and chaff cutters, and pull equipment used to clear dense growths of shrubby plants, as well as purchases of sub‐surface ploughs to drain wetlands.…”

“…In an earlier article, Holland and Olson () documented effects of the long recession in the last two decades of the nineteenth century on the rural landscapes of southern New Zealand and of the surge of purchases of capital items that started about 1896. Here we differentiate several levels of transformation: changes on 13 properties, contrasts between two marketing areas (the spheres reflected in the activities of LMA and WS, respectively) and the broader trajectory of the region as a whole.…”

Peter Holland, 1939–2019

“…He later published a monograph, Home in the Howling Wilderness , the culmination of his research on how colonial settlers came to terms with the environment in southern New Zealand (Holland, ). He continued to work most days in the Hocken Library, latterly using stock and station agents' records to assess rural landscape change from late colonial times, the basis of an ongoing set of publications with Sherry Olson (Holland & Olson, ; Holland, Olson, & Garden, ). His last public presentation was on this theme, when he spoke at a symposium to mark the retirement of Professor Tom Brooking, the co‐leader of “Empires of Grass,” at the Hocken in November 2018.…”