428 Transactions of the 



IRRIGATION. 



NATURAL DRAINAGE SYSTEM — THE KERN COUNTRY. 



The natural drainage system of the country, embraced in what are 

 called the San Joaquin and Tulare " Valleys " (a misleading word to des- 

 ignate those vast, and, to the eye, boundless plains), is as follows: 



At the extreme south the Kern country is a grand circular plain, around 

 which sweep, for three fourths of its circumference, the Sierra and Coast 

 Mountain systems. These limit it on the east and west respectively, 

 joining their areas of upheaval to form its southern boundary. This 

 country is open to the north (the direction of the flow of its drainage), 

 where it is bounded by Tulare Lake. At its upper or southern end are 

 two small lakes — Buena Vista and Kern. All these southern lakes, it 

 must be understood, are not basins of water surrounded by hills — they 

 are merely areas of the general plain which shelve downward at a slope 

 so slight as to be imperceptible to the eye. A rise of a few feet in their 

 water extends their surface for several miles over the surrounding 

 plains. In fact, a rise of only three or four feet above ordinary high 

 level in Tulare Lake, serves to place the entire country, for an area em- 

 bracing hundreds of square miles, under water. At the ordinary Sum- 

 mer stage of water, cattle are seen feeding out in the lake on the long 

 tule grasses, a distance of a half mile to a mile from its margin, standing 

 knee-deep to belly-deep in the water. We see, then, that the drainage 

 system of the Kern plains and their bounding mountains is, that the 

 rainfall is first poured into Buena Vista and Kern Lakes at the upper or 

 southern boundary of the plain, whence it flows down into Tulare Lake 

 at the northern boundaiy. On the eastern side, Kern Eiver and other 

 considerable channels pour the waters from the adjacent portion of the 

 Sierras directly into Tulare Lake. On the western side, the mountains 

 approach the lake, and at a single point send dow T n a spur to its shore. 



NATURAL DRAINAGE — TULARE. 



A second great natural division of the country, and lying next north 

 of Kern, is that which drains directly into Tulare Lake, embracing the 

 whole of Tulare County, and so much of Fresno County as is drained 

 by King's Kiver, which empties into the lake near its northern extrem- 

 ity. The civil and natural division between Kern and Tulare Counties, 

 is the line of Tule River, which empties into the eastern side of Tulare 

 Lake, near its center. Going north from the Tule we come next to the 

 considerable river known as Kaweah Creek, W'hich, dividing east of 

 Visalia, into four principal channels, gives name to the "Four Creek 

 Country." or Visalia Delta; these creeks also flow into the lake. Next 

 north comes the great King's River, discharging the rainfall of the 

 stupendous King's Canon, and its tributary mountain chasms, the 

 grandeur and sublimity of whose scenery have been the inspiration of 

 some of the most glowing descriptions given by Clarence King, and 

 other explorers of the high Sierra. In these descriptions it will be 

 remembered that the high Sierra, as seen from Mounts Tyndall, 

 Whitney, or other of its loftier summits, presents itself as a wild sea 

 of stupendous peaks, tossed into the sky in titanic confusion, and 

 deeply cleft by two principal chasms, which start from a common point, 

 and sweep away — the one northwardly and the other southerly — 



