THE IEKIGATION AGE. 



317 



UNDERGROUND WATER FLUC- 

 TUATIONS. 



A new investigation of tbc supply of under- 

 ground waters in southern California has late- 

 ly been started by the United States Geolog- 

 ical Survey at the request of the California 

 Conservation Commission, which will meet the 

 larger part of the necessary expenses for field 

 and office work. This work serves to call 

 public attention to the results attained in the 

 same region by the Federal Survey through 

 earlier work, which was begun nine years ago 

 under the specific authority of the annual Con- 

 gressional appropriation "for the investigation 

 of underground currents and artesian wells." 

 Five reports were issued as a result of that 

 earlier investigation. Three of these, Water- 

 Supply Papers 137, 138 and 139, related to the 

 coastal plain of southern California, and a 

 fourth, No. 142, described the San Bernardino 

 Valley. None of these publications are now 

 available for free distribution by the Survey, 

 but they may be purchased from the Super- 

 intendent of Documents, Government Printing 

 Office, at 35, 25, 25 and 25 cents, respectively. 

 Of the fifth report, Water-Supply Paper 

 219, which describes the foothill belt east of 

 Los Angeles, a small supply remains available 

 for free distribution, and a copy may be ob- 

 tained by addressing the Director of the 

 United Slates Geological Survey at Washing- 

 ton. 



This series of papers, by W. C. Mendenhall, 

 geologist, sets forth the obvious relation be- 

 tween the maintenance of the supply of ground 

 waters and the continuance of agricultural life. 

 To measure the possible fluctuations in ground- 

 water levels intensive studies were made and 

 exact measurements procured. As a result of 

 the study of several thousand wells and of 

 the geological conditions which control the dis 

 tribution of the underground waters within the 

 area of 1,000 square miles covered by these 

 reports, it was recognized that some parts of 

 this area constitute separate and independent 

 water basins, so that local conditions may 

 cause local fluctuations not related to those of 

 adjacent areas. 



Basing its action in part on the results of 

 this geologic investigation, Congress in 1908, 

 created a reservation of eight sections 5.120 

 acres of vacant public land within San Ber- 

 nardino Valley, for general use in checking 

 and spreading flood water and thus increasing 

 its contribution to the underground supply. 

 Prior to the creation of this reserve the local 

 water companies for some years had been 

 spreading the flood waters for the purpose 

 of increasing the proportion of them abso- 

 sorbed by the sands and gravels and added to 

 the underground supply. It is to determine 1 

 the practical effects of this work that the 

 California State Conservation Commission has 

 asked the United States Geological Survey to 

 undertake the present research. 



To this task has been assigned as the 

 Survey's direct representative, Mr. Charles 

 H. Lee, who, under the direction of Chief 

 Engineer William Mulholland, of the 1 Los An- 

 geles Aqueduct, through a cooperative agree- 

 ment between the managers of the aqueduct 

 and the Geological Survey, has just completed 

 a careful study of the quantity of surface 

 waters absorbed by the underground reservoirs 

 of Owens Valley. These reservoirs have re- 

 cently been purchased by the city of Los An- 

 geles to augment the surface supplies available 

 for the aqueduct which it is now construct- 

 ing from a point above Independence to Los 

 Angles, a distance of 240 miles. A Survey 

 water-supply paper is now in press report- 

 ing the results of Mr. Lee's intensive studies 

 in Owens Valley. 



In carrying out the investigations in the 

 San Bernardino Basin Mr. Lee will find avail- 

 able the results of the earlier studies made by 

 the Geological Survey in that basin, and these 

 studies will be augmented by certain observa- 

 tions made since then by the citizens and water 

 companies who have come to realize the sig- 

 nificance of ground- water fluctuations as in- 

 dicators of the status of the underground 

 supplies. 



For comparison with conditions in this basin 

 where artificial means have been taken to main- 

 tain ground-water levels, there are available sys- 

 tematic measurements of water levels in other 

 basins where such conservation work has not 

 been undertaken. These comparative studies 

 should aid in eliminating from the San Ber- 

 nardino yalley problem those factors of 

 varying rainfall and varying draft on the un- 

 derground water supplies which are sufficient 

 in themselves to account for widespread fluc- 

 tuations in the water levels from year to 

 year and from month to month. 



It is expected that this latest investigation 

 will be one more of the careful researches 

 on the various factors that affect ground- 

 water supplies in the Western States which 



have been carried out by the United States 

 Geological Survey within the past decade. The 

 work done in each of the fields that have 

 been entered indicates clearly that general 

 statements based on isolated observations or 

 mere reports by individuals are of no value. 

 Careful quantitative data procured by geolo- 

 gists and engineers on the ground alone jus- 

 tify generalizations as to the upward or down- 

 ward tendency of the ground- water levels, 

 the rates of movements of ground waters, and 

 the quantities passed into the atmosphere 

 through captlarity, evaporation, and transpir- 

 ation. 



VALUE OF THE SEWAGE WE 

 THROW AWAY. 



H. C. Bradley of the University of Wiscon- 

 sin, writing in the current issue of Farm a\nd 

 Fireside on saving sewage for the garden, says 

 in part : 



"One of the big problems that confronts 

 this country is the maintenance of soil fer- 

 tility. We cannot hope to go on forever tak- 

 ing off crops from the land and turning the 

 sewage which those crops yield into the ocean. 

 The phosphates, sulphantes and potassium must 

 eventually disappear from soils which are 

 steadily cropped, and unless the deficiency is 

 made up the crops themselves will cease to 

 grow. At present we make up this deficiency 

 by stable manure and artificial fertilizers; but 

 no one can deny that this partial return to 

 the soil of its essential constituents is but put- 

 ting off the day of reckoning to a future gen- 

 eration. The only permanent plan for pre- 

 serving the soil fertility in this or any other 

 country is to return to the iand everything es- 

 sential to plant growth which the crops them- 

 selves remove. And the only way to accom- 

 plish this is to return sewage to the soil, for 

 human sewage is the final form to which all 

 edible crops are brought. The ninety millions 

 population of this country every year eliminate 

 90.000 tons of phosphoric acid, 90,000 tons 

 of sulphuric acid, 90,000 to 135,000 tons of 

 potash, 9,000 tons of magnesia, 900,000 tons 

 of organic material, of which about 300,000 

 tons is valuable nitrogen in its most available 

 form for plant-food. Of this total approxi- 

 mately 300,000 tons mineral and 900,000 tons 

 organic material, a small part, is returned to 

 the land by cesspools and similar devices for 

 disposal, but the vast bulk of it is poured 

 directly or indirectly through our rivers into 

 the sea, from which we can never regain 

 it. And such devices as the cesspool bury 

 the material at such a depth that it becomes 

 pract-'cally unavailable to the shallow- rooting 

 food-desiring plants. 



"The problem of soil fertility thus becomes 

 ultimately a problem of practical sewage dir- 

 posal, and we may confidently assert that at 

 no far distant time this problem will havs 

 to be faced and solved if our land is to 

 maintain its product'' veness and increase its 

 yield of food materials to meet the needs of 

 a growing population." 



QUICKSILVER PRODUCTION 

 INCREASES. 



The production of quicksilver in the United 

 States in 1911 was the greatest since 1907, 

 the total output being 21,256 flasks of 75 

 pounds each, valued at $927,989, against a 

 production of 20,601 flasks, valued at $958,153, 

 in 1910, according to an advance chapter on 

 "Quicksilver for 1911," by H. D. McCaskey, 

 .from "Mineral Resources of the United States 

 for 1911." California was the greatest pro- 

 ducer in 1911, with 18,860 flasks, valued at 

 $867,749, and the remainder of the quicksilver 

 came from Nevada and Texas. While there 

 was an increase in the output of quicksilver 

 last year, the amount produced was over 5,000 

 flasks below the average annual output of 26,- 

 609. 5 flasks for the decade ending with 1911. 

 Until Texas began production in 1899 Cali- 

 fornia supplied practically the entire output of 

 the United States for the last half of the nine- 

 teenth century. 



Quicksilver is consumed mainly in the man- 

 ufacture of fulminate for explosive caps, of 

 vermilion, of drugs, of electric lighting appa- 

 ratus, of scientific apparatus, and in metallurgy 

 in the recovery of gold and silver (principally 

 gold) by amalgamation. 



The annual domestic consumption appears to 

 have been in recent years from 18,000 to 

 21,000 flasks, or about equal to the domestic 

 production. The decrease of domestic stocks 

 and higher prices in 1911, however, caused an 

 increased importation of quicksilver the heav- 

 iest in many years from 667 pounds, valued 

 at $381, in 1910, to 471,944 pounds, or 6,293 

 flasks valued at $251,386 in 1911. On the other 

 hand, our exports of quicksilver decreased from 

 1,923 flasks, valued at $91,007, in 1910, to 291 

 flasks, valued at $13,995, in 1911 the smallest 

 export in many years. 



L G. $R.C. CARPENTER 



Consulting Engineers 



Investigations, Examinations, Reports. 



Denver, Fort Collins, Colorado; Ithaca, 

 New York; Denver, Col., Equitable BIdg. 



L. G. CARPENTER 



P. J. PRESTON 



Former State Engineer Deputy State Engineer 



Membe^IrriSonCon, C " rad 



misson, British Columbia 19031906 



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