LUCERNE IN PATAGONIA 155 



advance of agricultural colonization has been slow. 

 Costly preparatory work is needed to level the ground 

 and organize the drainage, otherwise saline patches 

 form and spread like leprosy at the expense of the 

 cultivable areas. Lastly, the centre of the valley is 

 exposed to floods. ^ 



The chief crops are lucerne, cereals, and the vine. 

 All the efforts and hopes of the colonists are now centred 

 upon the vine. It is for the purpose of extending the 

 vineyards that they are endeavouring to secure more 

 workers. These are a singularly mixed lot, Chileans 

 from the Neuquen rubbing shoulders with Latin immi- 

 grants (Italian and Spanish) from the region of the 

 Pampas. 



The lucerne is made up in bales and exported by rail 

 to Bahia Blanca and Buenos Aires. The economic 

 life of the agricultural oasis of the Rio Negro is no more 

 connected with that of the pastoral tableland than is 

 life on the Chubut. Neither sheep nor cattle are 

 fattened on the Rio Negro. It is a curious contrast 

 to the spectacle offered by the Andean regions of western 

 and north-western Argentina, where for generations 

 there has been a close association between the breeding 

 industry of the scrub and the fattening on the lucerne- 

 farms. This is because the currents of the cattle-trade 

 are not here as permanent and stable as they are in 

 the north. The time when the convoys of Pampean 

 cattle bound for Chile used the valley of the Rio Negro 

 preceded the agricultural colonization of the banks 

 of the river. The conquest of Patagonia put an end 

 to this traffic. There was an interval of twenty-five 

 years between the period of the export of Pampean 



■ The work now (1914) in hand will reduce the risk of floods, and 

 will enable them to enlarge considerably the extent of the tilled land. 

 The Cuenca Vidal, which opens amongst the sandstone, below the 

 level of the valley, on the tableland to the north of the Neuquen, 

 will be arranged so as to absorb the flood-water, and it will feed a 

 canal which will serve the left bank over an area of 100 miles. The 

 waters of the Limay will be available for the lower valley. 



