ALASKA EXPEKIMENT STATIONS. 297 



The trail through the canyon was the most difficult task the trail 

 builders had to encounter, but here as elsewhere the work was well 

 done. The Government trail from Valdez is a great help to one going 

 into the interior. Good work has been done as far as the Tanana 

 River, 265 miles from Valdez, and while the trail is far from being a 

 good wagon road in the summer months, it will afford a splendid sled 

 road, and even wagons could be used before the frost leaves the ground 

 in the spring. To one who knows anything of trail building in Alaska 

 the surprise is not that the trail is no better, but rather that it is as 

 good as it is. After leaving the canyon we traveled down the bed of 

 the Lowe River, which spreads over a large gravel flat. In places the 

 trail led through timber for a short distance, and here the large trees, 

 clear of branches for 50 feet, and the large rank ferns which grow in 

 great masses, cause one to forget for a moment that these are Alaskan 

 products. 



We reached Valdez on the morning of the 28th, and I sailed on the 

 Bertha about noon the 1st day of October. 



Isaac Jones, 

 Assistant, Alaska Investigations. 



Prof. C. C. Georgeson, 



/Special Agent in Charge of Alaska Investigations. 



NOTES AND COMMENTS ON REPORT OF MR. JONES. 



This report by Mr. Jones is the first attempt that has ever been 

 made to describe the agricultural features of the region which it covers. 

 He gives a succinct and systematic account cf those features in the 

 territory he passed through which would naturally be noticed by an 

 agriculturist. The character of the surface, the kind of soil, its slopes 

 and exposure to the sun, the vegetation, the water courses, the drain- 

 age of desirable tracts, distances, and the character of the trail. He 

 points out the unfavorable features as well as the favorable ones. The 

 sharp, uncompromising mountain ridges which cover large areas; the 

 steep and rocky hillsides, and the wastes of bog and marsh land are 

 noticed as well as the great meadows and the expansive vaMeys of fer- 

 tile alluvium. He notes also the few natives which inhabit this region, 

 their condition and their prospects. It is to be observed that this 

 reconnoissance covers only the region which can be seen from the trail. 

 Broadly speaking this is a strip about 30 miles wide by 435 miles long, 

 the distance between the two terminals. Outside of this strip we know 

 as yet little or nothing as regards the areas available for farming and 

 grazing; but it may not be unfair to assume that the region south of 

 the Yukon will average about as the strip here described. If we fol- 

 low the sixty -third parallel from east to west, which nearly bisects 

 this vast region, we shall find that the distance in a straight line from 



