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16 January 1908
Cooyal Station.
Forty years ago, before the advent of the free selector, old Cooyal station knew no boundaries. Old time shepherds rose at dawn, and betook themselves with their flocks to fresh localities each day for a week. Then they shifted their headquarters for another week, and ' killed time,' as they put it, on the first day by erecting a bush fence round a small area of land, which did service as a temporary camping ground. Thus their nomadic and uneventful life was passed, and, as the shepherd was generally illiterate, he yearned for no other society than that or his faithful dog. He was an expert beehive finder, and often passed his dreary days by robbing bees nests, and he supplemented his income with the sale of the honey. The sting of the bee had no terrors for him, as he generally had an antidote at hand. This Robinson Crusoe was the sworn enemy of the free-selector in the early days, when there were no boundary fences, and a bitter feud was kept up between them. Gradually the settler became too numerous, and the Cooyal run had to be concentrated round the present homestead. The old station has always been famous in some respects. In the days of the late Mr Samuel H. Blackman some of the best steeds Australia has produced were bred there. Who has not heard of the great Sting, and other well remembered racers? Of late years, since the property passed into the hands of Mr. C. S. Murray, Cooyal wool has topped the market year after year, and never was the demesne clothed in such luxuriant verdure as at the present time. Grass is everywhere about a foot high, and 120 acres, which are devoted to fodder growing, form one waving meadow, with lucerne three feet high. The agriculture is in the capable hands of Mr. Thomas Woodorth, who adopts scientific methods in the production of crops. Passing through the locality about 10 days ago, a representative of this journal noticed a large field of oats, over four feet high, and about 20 acres of maize, averaging over nine feet in height. Indications certainly point to a return of the prosperous seasons that prevailed in the district in the seventies and eighties1 .