408 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



$45 per acre, payable in not less than 

 five nor more than ten annual instal- 

 ments. In addition there is an annual 

 charge of $i per acre for operation and 

 maintenance. One-tenth of the build- 

 ing charge and one year's maintenance 

 and operation fee, or $5.50 per acre, be- 

 comes due at the time of filing. 



The Huntley project is situated on a 

 part of the ceded portion of the (/row 

 Indian reservation, and settlers are re- 

 quired to pay $4 per acre to the In- 

 dians, Si at the time of entry, and 75 

 cents annually for four years. The 

 cost of building the irrigation works is 

 $30 per acre, payable at $3 per annum 

 for ten years ; the payments may be 

 made in five years if desired. The 

 maintenance charge is 60 cents per 

 acre. The first payment of $4.60 be- 

 comes due when the land is filed on. 



The cost per acre of water rights on 

 the Lower Yellowstone system has not 

 yet been determined, but water will be 

 available for forty-eight thousand acres 

 in the spring of 1909. 



Would Prevent Spring Floods 



THE greatest development of water 

 power that has ever taken place in 

 the United States has been accom- 

 plished during the last few years on 

 the rivers which drain the Southern 

 Appalachian Mountains, according to 

 an official report on the water re- 

 sources of this region. It is estimated 

 that there is at least two million eight 

 hundred thousand indicated horse- 

 power developed by the streams which 

 have their headwaters on this water- 

 shed. and more than half of this indi- 

 cated power is available for economic 

 development. 



Only a comparatively small part of 

 this has been made use of yet, but the 

 portion that has been utilized has been 

 one of the most important factors in 

 the recent industrial development of 

 the South. In the future the use of this 

 power and its value are bound to in- 

 crease tremendously. Manufacturing 

 plants are constantly increasing in num- 

 ber in the region, and it is reasonable 



to expect that in time the center of the 

 cotton-weaving industry in the United 

 States may be moved from the streams 

 of New England, where it has remained 

 so long, nearer to the source of supply 

 for the raw material. 



Moreover, water power, or power 

 originating in the streams, will be more 

 and more in demand here, as every- 

 where else in the country, on account 

 of the increasing cost of fuel power 

 through dwindling fuel resources of 

 the country. Already the water power 

 costs much less than the fuel, and the 

 difference will inevitably grow greater. 

 One great difficulty of the users of 

 water power, not only in the South, 

 but along the New England streams as 

 well, though possibly to a less degree. 

 is the fact that it cannot be depended 

 upon the year around, but must be sup- 

 plemented" and replaced for some weeks 

 or months every summer by costly fuel 

 ]> >\ver. beeau^e the streams run too low 

 to be of service. 



More than this, as the years go on 

 mill owners are painfully aware that 

 the low-water periods are growing 

 longer and longer. This is because 

 the forests at the headwaters of the 

 streams are being cut off. with the re- 

 sult that the melting winter snows and 

 the spring rains pour off the denuded 

 and hardened land in devastating 

 floods, sending down for a few weeks 

 far more water than they can use, and, 

 moreover, reducing the capacity and 

 usefulness of their mill ponds by filling 

 them with hundreds of tons of sand 

 and soil which the floods scour off the 

 unprotected upper slopes. 



\o\vhcre are business men wider 

 awake to the danger than in the South. 

 If indiscriminate cutting of the for- 

 ests on the crests of the watershed can 

 be stopped there is a possibility, ac- 

 cording to a recent report of experts, 

 of increasing the development of power 

 up to anywhere from three to thirty 

 times the one million four hundred 

 thousand horsepower at present availa- 

 ble. Without it, almost nothing can be 

 done. The method proposed to develop 

 the Appalachian river resources to the 

 total of forty-two million horsepower i< 



