THE IKEIGATION AGE. 



237 



IRRIGATION INVESTIGATIONS FOR 1902. 



BY EL WOOD MEAD. 



The essential features of the Eeview of Irrigation 

 Investigations for 1902, from the annual report of the 

 United States Department of Agriculture, Elwood Mead, 

 irrigation expert, in charge, present matters of so 

 great interest to our readers that it has been deemed 

 advisable to utilize it in this issue at the risk of 

 crowding out other matter of import- 

 ance, but not so immediate as this. 

 The report is down to June 30, 1902, 

 but is just published by the govern- 

 ment and therefore new. 



The report in its introduction 

 points significantly to the rise in value 

 of irrigated land and water rights, 

 in many sections the price of farming 

 lands having doubled and nearly 

 trebled. This is due principally to 

 rise in value elsewhere, changes in 

 the methods of conducting the range 

 live stock business, growing trade with 

 Alaska and the Orient, and the pas- 

 sage of the national irrigation act, 

 which is a most potent factor in en- 

 hancing the price of land and water, 

 and increasing the area of cultivation. 



Drainage is regarded as an im- 

 portant means of increasing this culti- 

 vated area, standing next to reservoirs 

 for storing water, strange as it may 

 seem. The cause, as explained, is due 

 largely to seepage, large areas having 

 been rendered unfit for cultivation by 

 an excess of water on that account. 

 All these lands will be restored to pro- 

 ductiveness by proper drainage. The 

 report says that the aggregate area 

 is surprisingly large and is being 

 rapidly extended, a fact which raises 

 the drainage problem from a local to 

 a general nature, involving, as it is 

 liable to do in time, all the older irri- 

 gated sections of the west, and the 

 valleys now being brought under cul- 

 tivation. 



The government is now engaged in 

 making surveys to prepare for the 

 emergency of drainage, actively so in 

 California and Colorado, where drain- 

 age is most needed, the object being to 

 provide for a reclamation of these 

 "drowned" lands, and the protection 

 of others from the threatened effects 

 of seepage by simple methods of drain- 

 age. 



In many parts of the west the 

 growing scarcity and greater value of 

 water is leading to the use of sources 

 of supply which were at first neg- 

 lected. The rise of soil water under 

 many irrigation canals has led to a 

 large increase in the number of wells 

 and pumping plants in the districts 

 watered. In other sections vigorous 

 search is being made for subterranean. 



sources. In the Santa Clara valley in California over 

 1,500 pumps are now supplying water to irri gators, and 

 along many western rivers there are now more pumps 

 than ditches. Figure 1 will show one of the pumping 

 methods, and the supply of water obtained. 



The water-right problems of the arid region con- 

 tinues to be a burning one. That there must be an ade- 

 quate settlement of this question is not denied, nay, it is 

 demanded. The statutes which govern the filing of 



950,000 

 900,000 

 850,000 

 800,000 

 750,000 

 700,000 

 650,000 

 600,000 

 550,000 

 500,000 

 450,000 

 400,000 

 350,000 

 300,000 

 250,000 

 200,000 

 150,000 

 100,000 

 50,000 



ANNUAL DISCHARGE 

 OF STREAM 

 4,202,013. 

 ACRE FEET 



Fig. 2 



ACRE FEET 



AVAILABLE FOR 



IRRIGATION BY DIRECT 



DIVERSION 



2,637,094. 



55 PERCENT OF 



ANNUAL FLOW 



ACRE FEET 



WHICH MUST 



BE STORED 



1,564,919. 



45 PERCENT OF 



ANNUAL FLOW 



Courtesy U. S. Dept. Agriculture. (Mead.) 



IRRIGATION INVESTIGATIONS DIAGRAM SHOWING FLOW OF YAKIMA RIVER, WASHINGTON, ANI> 

 STORAGE REQUIRED FOR ITS COMPLETE USE IN IRRIGATION. 



White areas represent amount of flow during nonirrigation period and unused flow during 

 April, May and June. Black areas represent amount of flow which could be used by direct 

 diversion. Hatched areas represent the volume which must be stored and the time of 

 its use. 



