PULSE OF THE IRRIGATION INDUSTRY. 



A great deal has been said this year in the papers 

 about the great drouth in southwest Texas, how 

 nearly all the stock was dead and that the people 

 would be in the same condition unless help in the 

 shape of supplies was sent at once. This is mislead- 

 ing to the general public as there is only a small 

 portion of the country in that condition, viz: the 

 county of Starr and part of Duval and Encinal, and 

 I think that the reason of their destitution is at their 

 own door. There has never been a time yet in the 

 history of this section of the country that it has not 

 been possible to raise a half bale of cotton to the 

 acre where they have taken the trouble to cultivate 

 the land. The white people of the above counties 

 are not starving, though they have lost a great deal 

 of stock, owing to the overstocking of their pastures, 

 but it is the Mexican who has heretofore taken care 

 of their cattle and who has been dependent on them 

 for a living that is now in trouble. These people are 

 too lazy to work land and raise enough to support 

 themselves, and, in fact, would rather starve than do 

 so. The rancheros do not wish in their own straitened 

 circumstances to have to support them, so have made 

 a great cry in the papers for help. 



The United States weather bureau gives this place 

 the mean annual rainfall for the past twenty years as 

 36.98; this is about the same as Iowa, Illinois, etc. 

 Now if this rain was equally distributed throughout 

 the year we would not feel the need of irrigation, but 

 as it sometimes comes in rains of from two to six inches 

 in 24 hours flooding the country and filling the rivers 

 and then perhaps not another for a month or two. 

 This is hard on market gardens. A good winter rain 

 will start them nicely, then comes a spell of dry 

 weather and they begin to suffer ; perhaps some of the 

 crop dies; then suddenly another heavy rain, or per- 

 haps a light shower, neither of them doing one-quarter 

 as much good as if we had a good irrigation ditch. 

 If garden truck and fruits can be placed on the 

 market ahead of California from two to four weeks 

 under the above circumstances, what would be the 

 results if we had irrigation? 



There are three plants that I know of in this part of 

 Texas, viz.: one at Brownsville, owned by Mr. Rabb j 

 who uses it for irrigating sugar cane and bananas; one 

 at Laredo belonging to the North Laredo Land and 

 Irrigation Company, who irrigate about 500 acres and 

 have most of it in grapes and a few gardens. The 

 last and youngest of the three is about 40 miles from 

 this place on the Nueces river. Mention was made 

 in one of your late issues about the starting of this 

 plant, stating that one hour and twenty minutes after 

 starting the pumps the river was dry. This is a 

 mistake. The pumps absorbed the flow of the stream 

 and at the above mentioned time no water flowed 

 below the plant. They have no dam and are depen- 



dent on what water may be in the river between rains' 

 If a series of dams were built on the Nueces river 

 enough water could be stored to irrigate an immense 

 quantity of land. If you will take the trouble to look 

 at a map of Texas you will see that this river rises in 

 the western portion of the State and consequently 

 drains an enormous body of land, thus insuring a good 

 supply of water. 



Nothing can be said for or against this plant as yet, 

 as it was started far too late to do any good to the 

 crop of early spring vegetables. But by December 

 it will have had a chance on the fall garden crop, and 

 then we will know more about it. We have several 

 other rivers and basins that could be utilized in this 

 part of the country. There are a great many arroyos 

 or gullies on the coast that could be easily dammed, 

 some of them being of very great size and capable 

 of irrigating a gopd deal of land. 



The Aransas, Chittipin and San Antonio rivers 

 could all be utilized, especially the two latter. There 

 are several irrigation schemes under discussion at 

 present and I look for the development of some of 

 them before long. I also expect to see great strides 

 made in the advancement of this country. 



Give us irrigation and we will make California 

 hustle to keep up with us. 



OBJECT LESSONS IN IRRIGATION. 



OBJECT lessons in irrigation are the most effect- 

 ive means of teaching the benefits to be de- 

 rived from the labors of placing water upon arid 

 land even under the most adverse conditions. The 

 traveler from the East going west over the Southern 

 Pacific line from Texas, after long and weary toiling 

 over apparently endless wastes of arid land, suddenly 

 comes upon the green alfalfa fields and fruit orchards 

 of the Salt River valley in Arizona. The transition 

 is so sudden and so complete that it is almost incom- 

 prehensible, and may well impress one as some trick 

 of a mighty conjurer whereby barren wastes and end- 

 less stretches of wearisome desert are made to ap- 

 pear like fairy-land. After all, it is a substantial 

 reality, and no magician has wrought the miracle. 



THE WATERS OF THE SALT RIVER. 



The prosy combination of the capitalist, the civil 

 engineer and the man with the shovel have wrought it 

 all out within a few months by turning the hitherto 

 useless waters of Salt river upon the thousands of 

 acres which now smile with their burdens of alfalfa 

 and vines and fruit trees. Toiling still westward 

 over other dreary stretches of inhospitable desert, the 

 traveler climbs a pass in the Sierra Nevada range 

 and then drops down into the valleys of the Sunset 

 slope. But the great magician's wand has already 



