Mesas de apoyo de herramientas

The striking consequence of this extensive granting of land was a period of prolonged pastoral growth. After 1810 sheep flocks increased rapidly, so that by 1817, only fourteen years after the first sheep had been imported into Van Diemen’s Land, their numbers exceeded those in New South Wales. According to the 1818 Muster, the estimated number of sheep was 127,883; in 1819 it was stated to be 172,128, which was more than double the number in New South Wales, where sheep had been established for thirty years. The return of sheep at the 1820 Muster totalled 182,468 of the Teeswater breed with a slight mixture of Leicester and a few from Bengal.28 In New South Wales in 1820 there were only 99,487 sheep, a mixture of Cape of Good Hope and the improved English, and where in 1821, there were 121,875. Sheep were shorn to help control scab, and until 1820 the wool was discarded. The earliest official records of use of the colony’s wool was in 1820, when it was purchased for 3d per pound for stuffing mattresses, and in the same year, 2,300 pounds shorn from the government flock, were sent to Sydney.29

During 1819 and 1820 adverse weather conditions in New South Wales made the supply of meat and grain precarious, and as market needs in New South Wales exceeded the quantity of wheat produced, it was imported from Van Diemen’s Land,

J.C. Garran & L White, Merinos, myths and Macarthurs. Australian graziers and their sheep 1788- 1900 (Sydney, 1985), pp.58, 171; Historical Records of Australia. Series I. Governors’ Despatches to and from England. Volume x. January 1819-December 1822 (Sydney, 1817), p.287 Annual Muster, 12 November 1819; J.T. Bigge, The Bigge Reports Volume 3. Report of the Commission of Inquiry on the State of Agriculture and Trade in the Colony of New South Wales, 1823 (Adelaide, 1966), pp.27- 8.

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some at 11s 0d and some at 12s 0d per bushel.30 In 1819 exports from Van Diemen’s Land consisted of potatoes which were reported to be equal to the best of English growth, 14,940 bushels of wheat, 3,620 kangaroo skins, 182 casks of salted meat, three tons of tallow, a quantity of tanned hides and some whale oil. In 1820, 44,000 pounds of salted meat were exported to Sydney, and the total value of exports from the colony in 1822 was £57,928, and in 1823 it was £24,734.31

In 1820 there were 28,828 cattle and 363 horses in Van Diemen’s Land, and 6,293 acres of wheat were under cultivation in the County of Buckinghamshire, and 2,983 acres in the County of Cornwall. According to Commissioner Bigge, the grain that was produced in the colony was a greater size and heavier weight than that of New South Wales, and was not liable to the same ravages of fly-moth or weevil.32 In New South Wales the wheat was affected with smut in very dry seasons, the fly-moth was generated in the grain which came from the settled districts, and despite this loss, an even greater and more consistent loss of grain was from weevil devastation after the wheat was stacked. The seasons in Van Diemen’s Land were more regular than New South Wales, the effect of blight or drought had very rarely been experienced, and on average for the five years to March 1820, the wheat yield was twenty-four bushels per acre and the quality was considered to be superior to that of New South Wales.33 By the close of 1821 the 7,400 inhabitants of Van Diemen’s Land possessed 35,000

Bigge, Report 3 Agriculture and Trade, p.21. 31

Bigge, Report 3 Agriculture and Trade, pp.54, 90; H.M. Hull, Statistical Summary of Tasmania from the year 1816 to 1865 inclusive. Compiled from government gazettes, blue books and statistical tables (Hobart Town, 1866),p.6.

32

Bigge, Report 3 Agriculture and Trade, p.26. 33

cattle, 170,000 sheep, 550 horses and 5,000 swine.34 By November the following year, the population had increased to 8,422, and the colony supported 41,863 cattle, the sheep numbers had dropped slightly to 165,208, and there were 7,354 swine.35

Activity in the sheep industry was stimulated by reports of good prices of New South Wales wool on the London market. In a positive move to improve the quality of wool in Van Diemen’s Land, Sorell imported merino ram lambs from John

Macarthur’s flock at Sydney. Recipients were settlers with over 200 ewes in their flock. Three hundred lambs left New South Wales on the Eliza, but due to

unfavourable conditions, on 27 March 1820 only 209 landed, and shortly after, a further twenty-four died. Thirty-three settlers at the Derwent and ten settlers at Port Dalrymple shared the surviving sheep at the cost of £7 7s 0d each. Sheep owners had suddenly become interested in wool.36

Sixty-five bales of wool containing 18,000 pounds of wool were exported to Britain by John Raine in 1820, and in 1822, 192,000 pounds of wool were exported from the colony. In quantity, this was comparable to exports from New South Wales,

although the quality was inferior. Four years later there were nearly 700,000 sheep in Van Diemen’s Land, which were the foundations of some of its finest studs. The

J West, The History of Tasmania, A.G.L Shaw edition (Sydney, 1981), p.60; M Nicholls (ed.), The Diary of the Reverend Robert Knopwood 1803-1838 (Hobart, 1977), p.347.

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Nicholls (ed.), The Diary of the Reverend Robert Knopwood, p.380. 36

Historical Records of Australia. Series III. Despatches and Papers relating to the settlement of the states. Volume ii. Tasmania July 1812-December 1819 (Sydney, 1821), p.744 Sorell to Gordon, McCarty & Loane, 22 November 1819. See Historical Records of Australia. Series III. Despatches and Papers relating to the settlement of the states. Volume iii. Tasmania January-December 1820

rapid increase of sheep was partly the result of natural advantages, incorporating large tracts of good pasture, well distributed adequate rainfall and generally reliable seasons.37