136 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



precedented for severity and length at 

 this season of the year, has frightened 

 many stock men, who fear they will not 

 have sufficient feed to last through the 

 winter. This has caused a rapid advance 

 in hay, with the prospects that it will ad- 

 vance to such a price that stock men can 

 not afford to buy, and will be forced to 

 place their cattle on the market. Bye 

 hay is now selling in that vicinity for $5 

 per ton, and there is a good demand for 

 it. Sheep men are buying all the rye hay 

 they can get, and if the cold weather con- 

 tinues the supply will be exhausted soon. 

 Then many cattle will be forced on the 

 market and the price will go down. 



Should snow be followed by a chinook 

 wind the situation will be relieved, for 

 Stock can then get considerable feed on the 

 range. We have sufficient hay to feed 85 

 days, which is 20 days longer than we 

 have ever been compelled to feed in the 

 16 years we have been in the business, 

 But there are many other stock men less 

 fortunate, who have not more than enough 

 hay to feed 30 or 40 days. 



The country about Winona and Endi- 

 cott is filled with sheep, flocks ranging 

 from a few hundred to 15,000 head. 

 Owners are becoming alarmed, for sheep 

 can not rustle feed in the deep, hard- 

 crusted snow which now covers the 

 ground. Sheep men have been making 

 money during the past two years, the 

 price of sheep and wool being nearly 

 doubled during that time. Common sheep 

 are now worth from $3 to $4 per head, 

 and there are not many offored for sale. 



As the range becomes fenced in sheep 

 men are turning their attention to im- 

 proving the quality of their flocks, im- 

 porting blooded sheep. I know of one 

 sheep man near Winona named Trobe 

 who, two years ago, imported a lot of 

 blooded rams. Last spring he got his 

 first crop of graded lambs, and has made 

 a small fortune already by the charge. 

 He has 800 ram lambs of last spring's 

 crop for which he has been offered and re- 

 fused $5 each, and is holding for $8 per 



head, which he is positive he will get be- 

 fo^e the lambs are one year old. Com- 

 mon lambs are worth from $2.20 to $3 : 

 each. Mr, Trobe says the blooded sheep 

 did not cost him a cent more to raise 

 than the others, and he has a nice bal- 

 lance on the credit side of the ledger in 

 favor of blooded sheep. His example 

 will be followed by other sheep men, and 

 in a few years there will be less sheep in 

 this country, but they will represent an 

 equal amount of money as the large flocks 

 and the profits will be greater." 



SENSIBLE SUGGESTIONS. 



In his address on ''Storage Reservoirs" 

 at the fall meeting of the California Po- 

 mological Society, Hon. Geo. H. Maxwell 

 said the construction of storage reser- 

 voirs for the arid region^ was "just as 

 much a matter of national concern as the 

 improvement of rivers and harbors and it 

 is only just, as between all the States, that 

 the arid States and Territories should 

 have their fair share of the grand aggre- 

 gate of annual disbursements by the fed- 

 eral government for internal improve- 

 ments, and that their share should be 

 used to build storage reservoirs within 

 their own boundaries. 



The great merit of this solution of the 

 problem of water development is not only 

 that it provides water without a corres- 

 ponding burden of debt, but that it pro- 

 vides it through a machinery already 

 created and in operation. All that is nec- 

 essary is for Congress to insert the neces- 

 sary appropriation in the River and Har- 

 bor Bill, and the War Department of the 

 government already has the most compe- 

 tent corps of engineers in the world ready 

 to take up the work of construction. * * 

 The way to do this is by co-operation and 

 organization. It is only by constant agita- 

 tion and a united public^entiment and de- 

 mand that we can secure the inauguration 

 of this policy. The more vigorously the 

 crusade is carried on the sooner will suc- 

 cess be achieved." 



Continuing Mr. Maxwell said, "While 



