First dwelling of a German settler, Rosewood, Queensland, ca. 1880 – State Library Queensland
Rosewood History. Qld.
Catholic Advocate (Brisbane, Qld.), Saturday, 25 May 1912, page 35
AN EXAMPLE TO IMMIGRANTS.
How Germans Prosper in Queensland.
The Rosewood District – Their Home.
The intending Irish emigrant to Queensland will probably have heard of the success of the German settlers in our State. There is a fine community of prosperous Germans around Rosewood, and the following facts and figures concerning their wonderful and well-seized opportunities will speak for themselves.
The Rosewood District is situated between the old Stanley, Bundanba, Fassifern and Lockyer electorates, which form its eastern and western boundaries. It extends south to the mountains at the head of the Bremer and north to where the foothills of the scrub join the Lockyer Plain. The Bremer River and Franklyn Vale Creek run through the southern portion, the north being watered by small watercourses, dams and wells. The main railway from Brisbane to Sydney via Toowoomba, cuts it in two, dividing the scrub from the forest country. It is all thickly populated, but the density of settlement is greatest north of the line, in what is known as the famous Rosewood Scrub. In the days of the early squatters this wide tract of country, thickly covered with brigalow timber and pine, was looked upon as almost worthless. Now it is cleared, the soil is so rich that many a man is making a comfortable living on 40 or 50 acres of it. South of the line the country is open forest. There is a fine farming settlement around Mount Walker, Glenalvon, part of which has been lately cut up, and thence to Rosevale, which is looked upon as the pick of the Southern Division.
Rosewood was one of the earliest farming communities in Queensland. Some of the settlers have been there for thirty-five and forty years. It was away back in sixties when the first hardy pioneers began their attack on the edges of the scrub. Many of them came with only an axe, a hoe, and a week’s rations. You can see these men today driving about in their buggies. The scrub was first settled round the edges, but as the adventurous cut their way in further and further towards the centre the whole of this rich tract was won for the State. This means that an area 25 miles long by 15 miles wide was transformed from a dense virgin brigalow forest, choked with vines and vegetation, to be the scene of hundreds upon hundreds of beautiful homesteads surrounded by waving crops and cultivated land, and carrying thousands of the finest dairy cattle in the country. The cleared scrub extends from Rosewood to Lowood, and from the forest lands about Walloon to Prenzlau. Nearly all this has been done by Germans and Danes. Even in 1875 the scrub came right down to the railway line, and you could shoot scrub turkeys within sight of the train. At that time most of this thriving farming settlement was impenetrable jungle. Most of it was taken up at 2s 6d per acre under the Act of 1868. The price of land is now £10 per acre right through the scrub, with that of superior quality up to £15, and good land in proximity to the railway, £20 and over per acre.
The settlers had a grim struggle from the start. Maize was the principal crop for the first twenty years, and for the first ten years there was little development as far as the township of Rosewood was concerned. The Rosewood, however, has always been the largest maize-producing district in Queensland, and big cheques were made in 1884, when the price of maize was high; £3000 worth of maize was sold in one month from Marburg to one firm. Again, in the nineties, maize was low; and, with bad seasons matters looked gloomy. But the settlers stuck to their farms. Later cams the era of scientific dairying and mixed farming. Since then the Rosewood farmers have never looked back. Previous to the advent of the separator and factory, farmers had sold butter as low as 1d to 1½d per lb. They now get four times as much for their cream.
The Rosewood farmers were the first to engage in in the new system of dairying. With characteristic earnestness they called a meeting to discuss the best course to adopt. This resulted in the establishment of the Lanefield Co-operative Dairy Company. This was, if not the first, one of the first institutions of its kind in Queensland, and as dairying was made a scientific study, and was conducted on progressive principles, universal prosperity followed in its wake. The Lanefield Company is long since defunct, but in its place there are cream separators on every farm, and half a dozen butter companies competing for the tremendous output of cream that is annually produced from these rich lands.
The cost of clearing the scrub may be put down at £1 per acre to fell and burn; but, of course, it depends on the weather. Burning off at a dry time might only cost 10s per acre; but, again, in a wet time it might cost £1 10s per acre. The system is to fell the scrub and set fire to it when dry. When there is a good clean burn, maize is put in between the stumps with a hoe. Crops are grown between the stumps for about three years, by which time they have rotted or been burnt out. The hills, being free from frost grow excellent lucerne; and it must be remembered that two crops of maize can be got in a year, and about six cuttings of lucerne in a good season. Sugar-cane is also being extensively grown around Marburg. The tendency is now to go more into sugar-cane than maize, and to still continue dairying. Maize, however, will still be grown to a certain extent for local wants.
One farm of 85 acres, at Tallegalla, was visited, on which sugar-cane, cotton, maize lucerne, potatoes, panicum, root crops, onions, and other vegetable were all growing. There were 50 acres under crop, mostly maize, which was estimated to go about 32 bushels to the acre. The sugarcane is planted in August and September, and cut in July, August, and September, generally going 10 to 12 tons to the acre. If left for two years it will go about 30 tons. The best varieties of cane will last without replanting for seven years, other sorts only last four. The cotton is sown in March, and picked from March to July as the pods burst. It lasts two years. After the first year it has to be pruned. It is planted very shallow – about 2 inches deep, in rows about 5 feet wide and 3 feet apart. From 3 acres on the farm nine bales of cotton were obtained – if it had been a good year ten bales were expected – at £3 per tale, giving a return of £27. All the picking was done by two school-girls and a little boy. The custom amongst many of the farmers is to put in a few acres of cotton for the girls and let them pick the crop and keep the money for themselves. There were also twenty-five cows on this farm of 85 acres – about fourteen in milk. On the cleared scrub land, two steep for cultivation, or which may be reserved for grazing purposes, the couch grass and panicum will carry a tremendous lot of stock. The farmers get a regular monthly cheque for their cream which more than pays living expenses. All the rest of the products of the farm is clear profit.
Nearly the whole scrub is peopled by foreigners – 80 per cent of the population around Marburg is German, and the percentage is greater at Minden. When they first started a good many of them had nothing at all.