172 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



Poatoes, onions, cabbage and crops of nearly every kind 

 showing corresponding increase in irrigated districts 

 over non-irrigated. While irrigation is going on the 

 sun shines and growth is continuous. 



Long ago the United States Government set the pace 

 and formed the popular conception of the proper size 

 of a farm as being 160 acres. This unit remains today 

 over nearly the entire Union, the popular view of the 

 amount of land one farmer ought to own and use. The 

 coming of irrigation has changed this view. In irri- 

 gated districts of the West, except where grain or hay is 

 raised exclusively, the small farms are becoming more 

 popular and profitable, 40 acres being ample for one 

 man and his family, while large areas especially near 

 the large cities are being divided into 5 and 10-acre 

 tracts, and on the small tracts where cultivation has 

 become intense and the best results realized from the 

 ground can be found a more prosperous class of 

 farmers than where the large farm is the standard, and 

 in but few locations in the West where other conditions 

 are favorable can good lands with water rights be ob- 

 tained for less than $50 per acre, $100 being more 

 nearly the average, while for the small tracts of 5 and 

 10 acres' the price will vary from $100 to $1,500 per 



years or it would run out. Thus it will be seen that 

 the irrigation bugaboo is a fallacy. 



Within recent years enterprising individuals, cor- 

 porations and even Uncle Sam have undertaken exten- 

 sive and expensive irrigation projects for the re-claim- 

 ing of large tracts of fertile lands which when once 

 placed under the magic touch of the life giving moun- 

 tain streams, become the most fertile and productive of 

 lands. Many of these enterprises involve the expendi- 

 ture of hundreds of thousands or even millions of dol- 

 lars in extensive reservoirs or expensive system of ca- 

 nals, often twenty, fifty or even one hundred miles in 

 length. With a good supply of water and the means 

 of applying it to the lands, an issue, of bonds based on 

 the lands or at a price of from $15 to $30 per acre 

 can be classed as among the very safest and best se- 

 curities and that would be the least affected, by periods 

 of repression, of any seciirities offered. 



NORTHWESTERN NOTES. 



Spokane, Wash., March 30. Private irrigation 

 plants are in building and projected in various parts of 

 the Inland Empire, embracing 125,000 miles in east- 



Durango, Colo., a Gem of the Mountains. 



acre according to location and surroundings. In Colo- 

 rado alone last year there was raised 128,613 acres of 

 sugar beets, an industry only in its infancy. Most of 

 these beets were raised on small farms of from 5 to 40 

 acres. The average price realized per acre for these 

 beets was $68. Potatos yielded an average of 160 

 sacks per acre. Returns from such a crop would yield 

 from $75 to $150 per acre. Strawberries and small 

 fruits yield from $200 to $800 per acre. Another im- 

 portant matter to be taken into consideration is the 

 question of fertilizers. In an irrigated country- the 

 use of fertilizers is almost unknown. Irrigation seems 

 naturally to enrich and renew the soil from year to year. 

 Again it is no uncommon thing to see timothy fields 

 yielding from 1% to 5 tons per acre that have been 

 seeded for a long term of years, the writer having per- 

 sonally seen large meadows that have not been re- 

 seeded for twenty years but producing as large crops 

 as when first seeded. In a non-irrigated section it 

 would be necessary to re-seed this at least once in three 



ern Washington, northern Idaho and northeastern Ore- 

 gon, and thousands of acres of land are being put under 

 water. The latest concern to be organized will be called 

 the Valleyford Water Company. It has a stated capital 

 of $40,000 which will be expended in building the irri- 

 gation system for all of the land lying within the town- 

 site of Valleyford, south of Spokane. The officers are 

 Arthur D. Jones, president; B. F. Kizer, vice-president; 

 W. E. Goodspeed, secretary and treasurer, all of 

 Spokane. Water will be taken from California creek, 

 which runs through the tract, also from a number of 

 artesian wells to be bored. Two of these have already 

 been sunk, and an inexhaustible supply of water having 

 been struck at the depth of 50 feet. 



The Fairview Heights Irrigation Company will 

 irrigate a tract of nearly 1,000 acres, six miles west of 

 Spokane. This project is somewhat different from 

 other irrigation enterprises, in that water is to be taken 

 from wells, one to be sunk on each tract, which con- 

 tains five acres. An inexhaustible supply of water is 



