1904 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



and that the Desert Land Act should, 

 as recommended by the Secretary of 

 Agriculture, be repealed ; and, also, 

 that the commutation clause of the 

 Homestead Act should be repealed." 



This was in January, 1902. 



In the following June, the National 

 Irrigation Act was passed, and that act 

 did provide, in conformity with the prin- 

 ciple set forth in the foregoing resolu- 

 tions, that the lands to be reclaimed 

 under it should be reserved for actual 

 settlers under the Homestead Act, and 

 that the control of their reclamation 

 should be wholly retained by the 

 national government. 



These provisions of that law were, 

 however, only secured in the face of the 

 most strenuous opposition from the in- 

 fluences which are now opposing the 

 further reforms in the land laws which 

 are advocated by this organization. 



In its resolutions at the said meeting 

 of this board in January, 1902, it urged 

 upon the Congress an increase of the 

 hydrographic appropriation of the U. S. 

 Geological Survey to $250,000, and the 

 construction of three national irrigation 

 systems one in Arizona, one in Nevada, 

 and one in Montana. 



These recommendations have so far 

 been carried into effect that the hydro- 

 graphic appropriation above referred to 

 has been increased from $100,000 to 

 $200,000. The large sums made avail- 

 able by the National Irrigation Act for 

 preliminary surveys thereunder have 

 made a further increase of said hydro- 

 graphic appropriation, for the time 

 being at least, unnecessary. 



IRRIGATION PROJECTS UNDER WAY. 



Under the National Irrigation Act the 

 construction of the Tonto Basin Reser- 

 voir in Arizona, the Truckee-Carson 

 project in Nevada, and the Milk River 

 project in Montana have been approved 

 by the Secretary of the Interior, and the 

 work of construction is actually under 

 way in Arizona and Nevada. 



The Tonto Basin Reservoir in Arizona 

 will be formed by the construction of a 

 dam on Salt River, which will be one of 

 the largest dams in the world. It will 

 rise 250 feet above the channel of the 

 stream, its thickness at the base will be 



1 88 feet, gradually tapering to a width 

 of 1 6 feet at the curb, and its width across 

 the canyon will be 800 feet. The cost 

 of the structure will be about $3,000,000, 

 and the storage capacity of the reservoir 

 will be about a million and a half acre- 

 feet a reservoir far larger than that 

 formed by either the great Croton Dam 

 or the Wachusett Dam. 



The contract has been let for the con- 

 struction of a canal in Nevada amount- 

 ing to about a million dollars, which will 

 take the flood waters of the Truckee 

 River across the divide for storage in a 

 reservoir on the Carson River, to be used 

 for the irrigation of lands lower down in 

 the Carson Valley. 



The surveyors and engineers have 

 been at work for several years making 

 the surveys and preparing plans and 

 estimates of cost of the Milk River pro- 

 ject in Montana. A discussion of this 

 enterprise by Cyrus C. Babb, engineer, 

 Geological Survey, is published in the 

 January number of FORESTRY AND IRRI- 

 GATION. The suggestion is made in this 

 article that the waters stored in St. Mary 

 Lakes might be allowed to run into 

 Canada and then back into the United 

 States through the Milk River, for use 

 in the Milk River Valley below. We 

 believe that this would be a most unsafe 

 and unwise plan, and urge the construc- 

 tion of a system of works which will 

 confine these waters at all times within 

 the territory of the United States under 

 one of the plans suggested in said article. 

 We also urge that the work of construc- 

 tion should be begun without delay on 

 the Milk River system, as soon as the 

 necessary plans and estimates of the cost 

 have been completed and approved by 

 the United States Reclamation Service. 



As soon as the work of construction 

 on this project begins, all the recom- 

 mendations of the aforesaid resolution 

 of the National Board of Trade will have 

 been carried into effect by the govern- 

 ment. 



TO SAVE THE PUBLIC LANDS. 



The resolutions of this organization, 

 adopted at its said meeting in January, 

 1902, urging upon Congress that the 

 Desert Land Act and the commutation 

 clause of the Homestead Act should be 



