1906 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



239 



During the last flood Salt River took 

 a sharp bend to the south near the in- 

 take of the power canal and made it 

 necessary to construct works to pre- 

 vent serious damage to the canal. The 

 emergency was so great that a large 

 force of men was immediately put to 

 work at this point. The Government 

 has contracted to furnish power to the 

 contractor who is to build the great 

 reservoir dam, one of the highest 

 structures of the kind in the world, 

 and any injury to the power canal 

 would cause severe loss to the con- 

 tractor. 



In Arizona the Reclamation engi- 

 neers are geing dubbed "rain-makers," 

 as ever since their appearance in Salt 

 River Valley the floods have been of 

 frequent occurrence and of unprece- 

 dented volume. 



Nevada 

 Work 



The construction of the 

 Truckee-Carson project, 

 rogressing Nevada, is progressing 



rapidly. At the present time 85 per 

 cent of .the works required to supply 

 the first 160,000 acres is completed. 

 During the present stage of high 

 water in Carson River the Truckee 

 River is not supplying the system, as 

 the flow of the former is ample at this 

 time. 



Three vitrified pipe openings have 

 been set in the main canal and water 

 will be delivered to settlers under this 

 part of the system during the month 

 of May. The old and new settlers 

 under the main distributing system are 

 now receiving their supply from it, 

 and with the exception of two districts 

 the lateral systems are now delivering 

 water. It is expected that the entire 

 lateral system will be in working order 

 at the end of the month. On force 

 account work is now being carried on 

 by the Government in six camps 400 

 men and 450 head of stock are em- 

 ployed. 



Uncle Sam, Uncle Sam wants Port- 

 Cement land cement and wants 

 Maker it badly. With 24 big 

 irrigation projects under construction 

 requiring hundreds of thousands of 

 barrels of cement the engineers are 



finding it next to impossible to obtain 

 anything like the quantity needed. The 

 unprecedented demand for this com- 

 modity all over the West has already 

 over-taxed the capacity of the mills, 

 and almost without exception the Gov- 

 ernment's requests for bids are turned 

 down. Apparently no manufacturers 

 west of the Mississippi are able to sup- 

 ply new orders. In reply to inquiries 

 from the Government they state that, 

 owing to the unusual demand new or- 

 ders cannot be accepted for several 

 months to come. Recently proposals 

 were requested from eight manufac- 

 turers and dealers in cement for 2,000 

 barrels required on an Idaho project. 

 Only one proposal was received and 

 that was at a rate 50 per cent higher 

 than the firm would have sold a few 

 months ago. Still later invitations for 

 bids for several thousand barrels were 

 sent to 23 dealers. Again but one firm 

 submitted a bid, and this was nearly 

 60 per cent higher than the normal 

 profitable rate of sale by this firm. 

 Other attempts to purchase cement 

 have been similarly unsuccessful. 



The Reclamation Service is gravely 

 concerned. It has let contracts for 

 structures involving millions of dol- 

 lars, and a failure to secure cement as 

 needed, entering as it does so largely 

 in the work, will be disastrous. Ow- 

 ing to the inaccessibility of many of 

 the Government works, the transporta- 

 tion of cement is difficult and costly. 

 This was particularly the case in Salt 

 River Valley in Arizona, where the 

 great distance from existing mills and 

 the expensive wagon haul, made the 

 cost prohibitive. After making thor- 

 ough investigation of the cost of bring- 

 ing in cement for the Roosevelt Dam 

 and other structures, the Government 

 erected its own mill and for several 

 months past has been turning out daily 

 hundreds of barrels of first-class ce- 

 ment at a price far below the cost of 

 cement shipped in. It is known that 

 materials required for manufacturing 

 cement of good quality exist near sev- 

 eral of the projects, and private parties 

 should embrace the opportunity to go 

 into the business. From the present 



