THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



91 



NEWS NOTES FROM IRRIGATION PROJECTS 



OF THE COUNTRY 



California 



The committee appointed by the 

 board of directors of the South San 

 Joaquin Irrigation District to secure 

 rights of way for drainage canals has 

 completed its work and has made a 

 formal report to the directors at the 

 district offices in Manteca. 



The state reclamation board at a re- 

 cent meeting ordered a new assess- 

 ment levied for the Sacramento by- 

 pass, amounting to $1,095,000. The 

 board at the same meeting cancelled 

 the previous assessment for the by- 

 pass, and the appointment of the three 

 assessors to levy that assessment. 

 Three new assessors were named to 

 apportion the levy, B. A. Etcheverry, 

 professor of irrigation at the Univer- 

 sity of California; Max W. Enderlein, 

 a former member of the state board 

 of equalization, and G. C. Hermann. 



The Madera irrigation bureau has 

 decided to organize an irrigation dis- 

 trict under the act of 1913, as a pro- 

 test against the recent action of the 

 Panoche company, which recently 

 filed with the state commission its ap- 

 plication for water from the rivers 

 from which the proposed Madera dis- 

 trict is to receive its water for irriga- 

 tion purposes. 



At a meeting at Princeton, Colusa 

 county, the organization of the first 

 unit of settlers on the Sacramento 

 Valley Irrigation project for the pur- 

 pose of taking over in units the canal 

 system of the Sacramento Valley 

 West Side Canal Company, was ef- 

 fected. The unit will be known as the 

 Princeton-Codora-Glenn Water Users' 

 Association, a mutual company. The 

 area comprising the district will be 

 between 16,000 and 20,000 acres. The 

 distribution system within this ter- 

 ritory will be taken over at a price 

 of approximately $160,000, at a cost 

 to the settlers of approximately $8 

 per acre. The district concerned is 

 known as the Sacramento River sec- 

 tion. Payments for the canal sys- 

 tem will extend over a long period. 



The proposal to organize an irriga- 

 tion district under the Wright law to 

 take over the Woodbridge canal sys- 

 tem is meeting with determined oppo- 

 sition on the part of some of the large 

 land owners in the proposed district. 



The water system which operates 

 from the Big ditch and which sup- 

 plies El Dorado county farmers with 

 water for irrigation and also conveys 

 water through the Big ditch to 

 Placerville for domestic purposes, is 

 still in dispute, with two companies 

 alleging ownership. The Placerville 

 Gold Mining Company contends own- 

 ership by virtue of a sheriff's deed de- 

 livered on February 23, and is going 

 about in improving the system. E. 

 R. Hough, trustee, is on the opposi- 

 tion side. Through his agent, Ray 



C. Beat, he asserts possession of the 

 properties and alleges that he is oper- 

 ating the system for the benefit of 

 the Dondholders of the Sierra Water 

 Supply Company, under a trust deed 

 against which no foreclosure has been 

 made. Hough also has a force of men 

 at maintenance work on the system. 



An agreement by which 12,500 acres 

 of fine land southeast Of Oakdale will 

 be irrigated is very near consumma- 

 tion between the newly-formed Wa- 

 terford Irrigation district and the old 

 Modesto Irrigation district. At a 

 meeting recently the Waterford dis- 

 trict offered to pay the Modesto dis- 

 trict $254,000 for the right to use the 

 main canals of the older district to 

 bring water to the lands. The land 

 is of the richest in the state, adjoin- 

 ing the best sections of both Modesto 

 and Oakdale regions, and it is believed 

 that a final settlement will follow soon 

 and work on the new irrigation sys- 

 tem begun. The matter must, of 

 course, be submitted to the electors 

 of the two districts for a final deci- 

 'sion. 



in bonds for the construction of the 

 Terra Bella Irrigation district, for the 

 reclamation of 15,000 acres of fine 

 citrus land. 



The state water commission has 

 granted the petition of Celso Tonello 

 for permission to take water from the 

 Stanislaus river by means of a pump- 

 ing plant, overruling the protests of 

 the Oakdale irrigation district against 

 this grant. The commission has, how- 

 ever, refused to allow Tonello's claim 

 to five cubic inches of water, and lim- 

 its his grant to sufficient water to ir- 

 rigate seventy acres. The ruling is 

 important, in that the commission de- 

 cides that as long as any farmer wish- 

 es to put water to beneficial use, he 

 may do so, provided it does not inter- 

 fere with vested or other rights in the 

 Stanislaus river. 



In the election held in Cardiff 

 March 10 there was an almost unani- 

 mous vote in favor of establishing an 

 irrigation district there. W E. 

 Kinder was attorney for the district. 

 An election to vote bonds in the sum 

 of about $100,000 to meet the ex- 

 pense of an irrigation plant will be 

 held in about sixty days. 



The supervisors at Los Angeles 

 early in March awarded $1,736,100 

 bonds, all that remains out of the 

 $2,600,000 issue for the San Fernando 

 irrigation district, to Perrin, Drake & 

 Riley, the E. J. Knight Company and 

 the Aronspn-Gale Company, who 

 placed a joint bid on them. The bid 

 was par with accrued interest on the 

 bonds for six and twelve months 

 and a premium of $50,000. Delivery 

 of the bonds is to be made, part at the 

 end of six months and remainder at 

 the end of twelve months. Originally 

 this combination offered only $34,800 

 premium, but raised it to $50,000 later. 



At the recent congress of the In- 

 land Waterways Association the Sac- 

 ramento River flood control project, 

 as planned by the state engineer, was 

 endorsed, also the plan for control of 

 the San Gabriel River by turning its 

 waters into Alamitos Bay. 



Oregon 



Unless the Vale-Oregon Irrigation 

 Company of Vale puts a larger force 

 at work and makes it certain that its 

 dam can be safeguarded before the 

 floods come on Billy creek, State En- 

 gineer Lewis will warn settlers to 

 leave the valley below the dam, it was 

 announced. Engineer Stricklin, who 

 was sent to examine the dam, found 

 that it was merely a concrete wall and 

 was wholly inadequate to hold back 

 heavy flood waters. He fully sustained 

 the contentions of the settlers as to 

 the danger of disaster in case of 

 flood. 



Sand Hollow land owners are suffi- 

 ciently interested in the proposed Sand 

 Hollow Irrigation project to put up 

 money toward the cost of engineering 

 and preliminary work. This is the re- 

 port brought by Project Manager J. 

 G. Camp of the reclamation service. 



The people of the Malheur Valley 

 are signing up petitions asking the 

 county court to establish a district 

 that will cover all the lower lands 

 that can be irrigated from a reser- 

 voir at the Warm Springs site on 

 the Malheur and, if acted on favor- 

 ably it will make feasible and prac- 

 tical the bonding of about 30,000 acres 

 of fine land for irrigation. This will 

 include several thousand acres of land 

 already under a partial water right, 

 but gives water to a great deal of new 

 land, at a minimum cost. 



All necessary legal formalities have 

 been completed for calling an election 

 for the purpose of issuing $1,250,000 



Utah 



Experiments with irrigating wells 

 in dry farm territory will be increased 

 this spring by the Utah state conser- 

 vation commission. This was decided 

 by the commission at a recent meet- 

 ing. These experiments will take place 

 at Nada and Malone, on the Salt Lake 

 Route, and in extending them the 

 commission acted upon the recommen- 

 dations of T. L. Allen, assistant secre- 

 tary of the commission, and L. M. 

 Winsor of the agricultural college. 

 These two recently visited the wells. 

 Last year forty acres of land at each 

 place were cultivated with water 

 pumped from the wells, under the im- 

 mediate supervision of Mr. Winsor. 

 The cultivation was an entire success, 

 it was stated, and now the plan is to 

 enlarge the area to eighty acres in 

 each place. The commission believes 

 that the well may successfully water 

 160 acres. 



