474 SKVEXTII REPORT OF THE FOREST, FLSM AND GAME COM.MLSSIOX. 



New York, Pennsylvania, etc., it will not pay to develop 24-horse power when the 

 initial cost much exceeds $200 per horse power, is taken into consideration. This 

 condition at once cuts out development in the woods, on small streams, long dis- 

 tances from the markets, etc. The figures given, which are necessarily approximate, 

 include the cost of storage reservoirs within practical limits. It also shuts out 

 development where deep foundations or long dams run the cost up to much beyond 

 this figure of $200 per horse power. 



Moreover, the streams issuing from the Adirondack region are, with one or two 

 exceptions, very much less subject to severe floods than other streams of the State. 

 The}' are, therefore, particularly valuable for mill streams because the expense of 

 repairing frequent damage will be materially less. The reasons for this fortunate 

 condition are two-fold: 1. They mostly issue from lakes, frequently of considerable 

 magnitude; and 2, The area is still largely covered with forests — in some cases with 

 dense primeval forests of pine, spruce, balsam and hemlock. 



In order to show the effect of temporary lake storage in reducing flood flows 

 Table No. 124, in the writer's Report to the Board of Engineers on Deep Water- 

 ways, may be referred to. This table contains about fifty cases of floods, mostly in 

 the central part of the .State, where the work for the Board of Engineers on Deep 

 Waterways was performed. The first case cited is that of Seneca River, with a 

 catchment area of 3,103 square miles. This stream takes the drainage of the follow- 

 ing lakes : Canandaigua, Keuka, Seneca, Cayuga, Skaneateles, Onondaga and others, 

 in which, with the water surface of Seneca River, itself, Montezuma Marsh, numerous 

 small ponds and fl<it valleys, there is a total tributary water surface of about 300 

 square miles. The severest flood known was in 1865, and amounted to from 22,ocr 

 to 26,000 cubic feet per second, or to about 8.5 cubic feet per square mile per second. 

 I his river, of course, presents an extreme case because very few streams have as 

 large a tributary water surface as this. It amounts to about io^« of the whole. 



As an example of streams without lake storage we may mention Upper Mohawk 

 River, Nine Mile Creek, Oriskany Creek, Cayadutta Creek, Skinner Creek, Beaver 

 Dam Creek ?.nd Independence Creek, which have flood flows of from 46 cubic feet 

 per square mile per second to 125 cubic feet per square mile per second. All of 

 these streams are without the regulating effect of lake storage at their head watei^s. 



Hudson Ri\'er has large temporary lake storage. The heaviest flood recorded on 

 this stream at or near Mechanicville was in the spring of i86g, which it flowed at the 

 rate of 15.5 cubic feet per square mile per second. If Hudson River were to 

 discharge water as rapidly as some of the smaller streams previously mentioned it 

 would sweep cut of existence the lower portions of the cities of Troy and Albany. 

 Below the mouth of Mohawk River the flooiis are much more severe on this stream. 



