payments, with interest on the deferred instalments at six per cent, per annum) ; the price 

 at which the State agrees to sell the land to the entrymen (usually $1 per acre, payable 

 in four annual instalments without interest) ; the quantity of water per acre required for 

 delivery during the irrigation season to constitute a water right, and all other details with 

 respect to the conduct and carrying out of the undertaking. Within three months from 

 the date of the execution of the contract, construction work must be commenced, and 

 prosecuted with reasonable diligence thereafter. One-tenth of the total construction work 

 must be completed the first year and the whole project completed within three years, 

 unless an extension of time is granted for reasonable cause. 



When the work has so far progressed that the contractor is able to deliver water 

 upon a part of the project, it may be thrown open for sale to entrymen in units. When 

 the project is completed, any lands within the segregation which are found not economi- 

 cally feasible to reclaim may be relinquished. Each water right is a definite interest in 

 the irrigation system, and when all the lands are sold and the settlers have completed 

 their final instalments, they own not only the land but the entire irrigation system as well, 

 and the contractor is eliminated. 



Large Profits in Carey Act Enterprises. 



Carey Act projects, properly conducted, are very profitable, and where the engineer- 

 ing work is competent, there is no reason why they should not possess the maximum 

 certainty of success. The water-supply is subject to accurate measurement beforehand. 

 The cost of the impounding dams, reservoirs, canals, ditches and laterals can be likewise 

 estimated with substantial certainty. And, lastly, the value of the lands when reclaimed 

 can be determined by soil analysis, in conjunction with the climatic conditions. The 

 States charges but $1 per acre for the land and allows the contractor to charge as much 

 for the water right as the soil's fruitfulness when reclaimed will justify, and yet leave 

 the settler "abundantly satisfied with his acquirement of the land and water right." The 

 price for the water right will range from $25 to $75 per acre in northern Nevada, and 

 to $100 per acre in southern Nevada. Such price is gauged almost entirely by the land 

 values, irrespective of the cost of the reclamation works per acre; and the project is not 

 "feasible" if the margin of profit to the contractor between cost and selling price of the 

 water right is not sufficiently large. As a general rule, the difference between the esti- 

 mated cost of the water right and the authorized selling price to entrymen is not less than 

 100 per cent, and frequently very much larger. While the contractor never owns any 

 of the land which the irrigation system reclaims, he is protected as thoroughly as though 

 he did. For from the date of the execution of the contract with the State, a statutory 

 lien attaches against the land for the selling price of the water right, and this lien is 

 superior to any mortgage or other obligation which the entryman can put upon it, and is 

 only lifted on the final payment for the water right. 



Only within the past two years has Nevada given any attention to the Carey Act. 

 The Legislature of 1911 passed a comprehensive measure covering the administration of 

 Carey Act lands, generally considered now to be the model law of the kind among the 

 arid land states. Its tendency is to eliminate fraud by close State supervision, and to 

 be of practical aid to legitimate enterprise devoted to the reclamation of the State's arid 

 wastes. 



Artesian Carey Act Projects. 



The discovery of artesian water in many of the valleys has led to a number of 

 applications for Carey Act lands where the proposed system of reclamation is by means 

 of artesian wells and pumping plants. In order to meet the situation, which is without 

 precedent elsewhere, the State Commission devised and adopted a procedure which 

 enables the contractor to undertake the sinking of artesian wells on a segregation without 

 being compelled, under his bond, to carry out the enterprise beyond the limits of "economic 



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