150 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Irrigated Areas in Arid Region. 



Some of the artesian wells are of enormous size,, and yield four 

 and five million gallons of water daily, capable of irrigating a sec- 

 tion of land. The greater number are small, however, and prob- 

 ably not capable of irrigating more than five or ten acres. Half 

 a million acres is the utmost limit of the present wells. Some 

 artesian districts contain at least that acreage, so that, if the water 

 supply is sufficient, a vast area will be reclaimed by this method. 



In the above table the most noticeable fact is that less than 

 half the area lying beneath the water ditches, and capable of irri- 

 gation, is now cultivated. This is because it takes a number of 

 years to settle the country, break up the soil, and bring it into 

 cultivation. In progressive communities the possible acreage 

 keeps ahead of the demand until the water supply or the land 

 supply is exhausted. Judging the future by the past, and taking 

 into consideration many projected ditch lines, there will be from 

 thirty to thirty -five million acres under some irrigation system by 

 the close of the decade, and the actually cultivated area may be 

 close upon twenty million acres. 



California has had a longer and more extensive experience with 

 irrigation than any other division of the arid belt, and immense 

 sums have been wasted in litigation and experiment. The sys- 

 tems now in use in different districts illustrate all the details of 

 the business. All the larger problems connected with irriga- 

 tion, such as seepage, drainage, reservoirs, alkali deposits, econ- 

 omy in distribution, can be studied in the valleys of California. 

 More particularly one sees private ownership and district owner- 

 ship in operation side by side, often in the same county. 



The Wright irrigation act, passed in 1887, gave a great impetus 



