14 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1897. 



What have been added since cannot be readily ascertained. The 

 canals and irrigating sluices already dug and in process of construc- 

 tion cannot be ascertained, but may be reckoned by the hundred, and 

 the immense products obtained from them are immeasurable. 



In the State of Washington, the Northern Pacific railroad is building 

 a canal sixty miles long, to be fed by water from the Yakima River, 

 at a point below that at which the water issues- from the mountains. 

 This canal, or ditch as they call it, will moisten thousands of acres 

 that were once selling at $1.50 per acre, but are now held at $45 per 

 acre. With the sale of these lands, stock in the irrigation company is 

 offered, so that when the laud is all sold, the stock will be owned by 

 the farmers. A second canal, 250 feet higher, is contemplated, and 

 added supply of water is expected from the large lakes on the eastern 

 slope of the Cascade Mountains. 



It was stated before the Congressional committee that 1,000,000 

 acres could readily be irrigated by the Rio Grande alone, and that the 

 area might be indefinitely increased by proper storage and careful use. 



In Calusa County, California, there are two classes of lands that 

 require irrigation : First, land which will yield crops without irrigation, 

 but which would double their crops under the influence of a regular 

 supply of water ; Second, desert lauds which will yield nothing at all 

 without an artificial application of water, either from irrigation works 

 or artesian wells, but will yield heavy crops under irrigation, wheat 

 producing 40 to 42 bushels to the acre. In Las Cruces, New Mexico, 

 their crops are corn, oats, barley, wheat and sweet potatoes; with 

 irrigation they cut 6 tons of alfalfa to the acre; grapes and all fine 

 fruits grow abundantly; some of the vineyards produce 16,000 to 

 24,000 lbs. of the finest grapes to the acre. The same ground not 

 irrigated produces nothing. In New Mexico it is estimated that ten 

 acres of irrigated land are more productive than forty acres without 

 irrigation. 



ARTESIAN WELLS. 



Another source of water supply already utilized to a considerable 

 extent, and rapidly increasing, is found in the Artesian wells; these 

 have been driven at various points, and in the great valleys afford a 

 copious supply of water, but on mountain slopes they are useless. 

 Wells of this kind have been procured in great number in California, 

 in Riverside and in the San Joaquin Valley ; others have been found 

 in the desert of Utah. They are also found at various points in 

 Mexico. But the greatest number of these wells, with the most abun- 



