THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



115 



more land than was necessary for their use, Congress 

 might provide for a sale of the surplus. That is ex- 

 actly what was done in the case of the Flatheads. On 

 April 23, 1904, the President approved a bill that had 

 passed Congress providing for the surveying of the 

 Plathead reservation, allotting to the Indians each an 

 eighty-acre tract, and the classification, appraisement 

 and' disposal of the remaining lands, such lands to be 

 subject to entry under the Homestead laws of the 



grown and where there is a good home demand for all 

 that can be produced. 



Montana is annually compelled to import from 

 other States more than six million dollars' worth of agri- 

 cultural, horticultural, meat, poultry and dairy prod- 

 ucts that could and should be produced within her own 

 borders the need of more farmers is evident. 



The country is splendidly watered. It has many 

 large valleys and numerous smaller ones. Their cli- 



On the Flathead. 



United States. Accordingly, by direction of Congress, 

 the reservation will be opened to settlement as soon as 

 the preliminary work can be completed. This will 

 throw open to settlement one of the largest unoccupied 

 tracts of land in the United States. Here in Western 

 Montana in the heart of a great and highly developed 

 country with one great transcontinental railway (the 

 Northern Pacific) crossing it from east to west with 

 the Great Northern forty miles to the north at Kalispell 

 and connected with steamboat line with the survey of 

 another railroad from north to south and abundant as- 

 surances that it will be built within seventeen miles of 

 Missoula, a city of 10,000 people and the educational 

 center of the State, is located this favored country the 

 great Flathead reservation. 



matic conditions are quite similar, the mean elevation 

 of the valleys being about 3,000 feet above sea level. 

 Some of the valleys are sandy, gravelly soil, while others 

 are of a heavy loam, but all highly productive when 

 put under cultivation. The sandy, gravelly soils require 

 irrigation. Those of loam require less irrigation, and 

 in some sections, particularly where there is a hardpan 

 subsoil, none at all is necessary. The latter is also 

 true of much of the land along the creek bottoms. 

 Probably one-half of the farming land of the reserva- 

 tion requires no irrigation. The general agricultural 

 and horticultural possibilities of the reservation are 

 similar to those of the farming sections of Missoula 

 and Flathead counties, which adjoin on either side, and 

 where results have been obtained that excel those of 



Cattle Roundup on the Reservation. 



Here, new, cheap and fertile lands may be had in 

 a country where all conditions combine to make the 

 chances of success in life many times greater than in 

 the overcrowded East, a country where there is a fine, 

 mild climate, where the lands are rich and productive, 

 where all kinds of grains and fruits can be successfully 



nearly every other section of the Union. If there be 

 any advantage in either section, that advantage is with 

 the reservation. It is an absolute certainty that any 

 products of the adjoining counties can be equally as 

 successfully produced there. 



The Flathead reservation has an almost ideal cli- 



