PULSE OF THE IRRIGATION INDUSTRY. 



179 



SUGAR BEETS. 



A beet sugar convention was lately held 

 in Fremont, Neb. 



Twenty-five hundred acres will be sowed 

 to beets in the San Juan valley in Cali 

 fornia. 



The people of Chadron, Neb., have 

 raised $25,000 to give as a bonus to the 

 establishment of a beet sugar factory. 



Over 450 acres of beets were raised in 

 Clay c6unty, Nebraska, last year, bring- 

 ing the grower the contract price of $5 per 

 ton. 



The Oxnard Beet Sugar Co., of Grand 

 Island, Neb. , agree to pay $5 a ton for all 

 beets with 12 per cent of sugar, and a 

 graded scale for beets that fall below that 

 percentage. 



A bill has been introduced in the Iowa 

 legislature calling for a bounty of one 

 cent a pound on sugar manufactured from 

 sugar beets, sorghum or cane grown with- 

 in the limits of the State. 



The fifteen sugar factories in Sweden 

 worked, in the campaign of 1895-96, 

 588, 708 ton of beets, and the refineries pro- 

 duced, from October 1, 1893, to September 

 30, 1894, 03.650 tons of refined, and, in 

 the same period 1894 to 1895, 72,298 

 tons. 



At the meeting of the Beet Growers 

 Union in Chino, Cal. , recently, the perma- 

 nent organization was completed by the 

 election of W. T. Hay hurst as president; 

 Elmer Scott, vice-president; W. Baker, 

 treasurer; W. M. Monro, secretary, and 

 E. M. Day, W. M. Monro and W. Baker 

 as executive committee. 



In Utah it is stated that the average 

 cost of cultivating, harvesting and deliv- 

 ering a crop of twelve tons of beets per acre 

 is from $28 to $35, and with the average 

 yield last year of 11.54 tons an acre the 

 farmer has an income of $49.05 an acre or 

 a net profit of from $14 to $21, besides 

 getting $28 to $35 in cash for his labor. 



NEBRASKA CANALS. 



Canals for irrigation purposes in Western 

 Nebraska are making considerable head- 

 way and quite a number are in successful 

 operation for a part or the whole of their 

 length. The best and latest estimate of 

 the mileage of constructed and proposed 

 canals is something over 2,000 miles, of 

 which 1,250 are now completed and the 



remainder under way. This mileage is 

 divided among 389 claimants of water 

 under the State law. There are supposed 

 to be almost or quite as many projects in 

 existence or active preparation whose 

 promoters have not yet made formal appli- 

 cation to the authorities, but it is presumed 

 that these are generally of small size and 

 of less general importance. More than a 

 million, dollars has already been expended 

 in irrigation works, and as much more will 

 be required to complete the State's system. 

 The number of acres of land covered by 

 constructed ditches is about 854,000 by 

 this is meant land to which water may be 

 applied. The area really in crop under 

 ditch for 1895 is less than 150,000 acres, 

 but it will be more than doubled this year. 



BOOKS AND MAGAZINES. 



No publication that comes to our table 

 is more welcome than that special ex- 

 ponent of Southern California most ap- 

 propriately named " The Land of Sun- 

 shine." We may also add that no 

 publication with which we are acquaint- 

 ed has a more distinctively local color 

 and flavor than this, and the color and the 

 flavor are both well pleasing. One fault 

 we must allege, if it be a fault; and that 

 is the habit so common among politicians 

 during election times of claiming every 

 thing in sight. It does not seern at all 

 probable that an All- Wise Providence ever 

 intended that all the good things of this 

 world should be packed away in one corner 

 thereof to the exclusion of all the rest of 

 creation. As we study this great law of 

 compensations, which seems to pervade 

 the whole universe, it seems much more 

 likely that when we put every advantage 

 and disadvantage into the balance, the 

 sum total of the differences between men 

 and places is much less th&n we are gener- 

 ally willing to allow. 



However, when every item is set down 

 on both sides of the book, California of 

 the South is still a land of beauty and 

 richness; a land of corn, and wine and 

 oil; a land to which all of us who have 

 ever lived there hope some day to return; 

 and meantime we have many a backward 

 glance over the shoulder, and many a long 

 drawn sigh of discontent. It is a land of 

 eternal beauty and '' The Land of Sun- 

 shine," is worthy of its habitat. 



Dr. CHAS. STIRLING. 



