148 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



There is a movement on foot among 

 Harness the advanced thinkers of the west to 



The form a feasible plan for storage of 



Colorado the upper waters of the Colorado 



River River and its tributaries and an effort 



will eventually be made to induce 

 the Government to make an appropriation for this 

 purpose. 



This plan of storage embraces a system of res- 

 ervoirs on the tributaries of the Colorado so that 

 the water may be held in check during the flood 

 time and so equate the flow and protect the lower 

 irrigated areas in the Yuma country and Imperial 

 Valley against floods which have ever been a menace 

 to this exceedingly productive section. 



As an illustration, the principal railroads were 

 compelled during the past season to keep hundreds 

 of cars loaded with rock on tracks laid on the levees 

 to prevent a break which would have caused a loss 

 to the settlers of crops amounting to between 30 and 

 40 millions of dollars. The breaking of one of these 

 levees would have let in a volume of water sufficient 

 to, temporarily at least, flood all cultivated areas in 

 the Imperial Valley and it is, indeed, doubtful if a 

 similar break, such as was encountered some years 

 ago and checked only after superhuman effort and 

 the expenditure of nearly 2 millions of dollars by 

 the Southern Pacific Railway Co. could be repaired 

 so as to permanently protect the valley. 



Those who read the story "Barbara Worth" will 

 have obtained a faint idea of the strenuous work 

 necessary to stem this great flow and again force it 

 back into its natural channel. The Salton Sea cov- 

 ering thousands of acres of fertile land in the lower 

 parts of the valley is a permanent reminder of the 

 power and destructiveness of this immense volume 

 of water ; a distinctive feature to any effort to im- 

 pound and control is the fact that all waters held in 

 reservoirs on the upper Colorado and its tributaries 

 will permit the engineers to equate the flow lower 

 down, after first being used to irrigate lands along 

 these upper reaches and then brought back into 

 supplemental storage basins from which power may 

 be developed in its course to the sea. 



The men who are planning this great undertak- 

 ing will perform a service not only to the railroads, 

 but are at the same time opening up large areas for 

 settlement in the valleys along the upper streams 

 which under present conditions and without this 

 storage would forever remain dormant and unpro- 

 ductive. 



This general plan is so far-reaching and of such 



magnitude that it is the opinion of the writer that 

 every true westerner may feel proud to assist in its 



development. 



Prompt dismissal of officials of the 

 Want Boise-Payette Irrigation Project re- 



Project sponsible for the "deplorable condi- 



Heads tion that now confronts the farmers" 



Ousted was demanded in a resolution passed 



on at a mass meeting of 450 Water 

 Users held recently in Caldwell, Idaho. 



Inefficiency of the Reclamation Service and the 

 incompetency and neglect of the local officials by 

 failing to see that the Deer Flat reservoir was well 

 filled for the present irrigation season is charged in 

 the resolution. An investigation of the Reclamation 

 Service by Congress also is recommended. By a 

 subsequent motion, Secretary Magee of the Water 

 Users' board was instructed to telegraph the resolu- 

 tion to the Idaho delegation in Congress, with the 

 added request that they help initiate an official in- 

 quiry on the part of Congress. 



The text of the resolution adopted by the mass 

 meeting follows : 



"Whereas a call has been made upon 

 all producers from the soil to increase the 

 production of foodstuffs for ourselves and 

 our allies ; and 



"Whereas the farmers of the Boise 

 project, responding to that call, have ex- 

 pended their full strength, both financially 

 and physically, in their effort to do their 

 'bit' in the defense of their country ; and 

 "Whereas there has been constructed 

 by the reclamation service an irrigation 

 and storage system for the proper irriga- 

 tion of about 250,000 acres of fertile land 

 at a cost of upward of $12,000,000; and 



"Whereas the snowfall in the mountains 

 has never been excelled and the prospects 

 for abundance of water for the proper irri- 

 gation of the lands has been and is now 

 better than ever before and the Boise river 

 has been running at flood ; and 



"Whereas in the midst of the irrigation 

 season, when the demand for irrigation 

 water is the greatest, we, the water users 

 of the Boise project, find, to our great in- 

 jury, the Deer Flat reservoir is now prac- 

 tically empty; and 



"Whereas there is a large acreage of 

 wheat and other crops, representing mil- 

 lions of dollars to the farmers and to the 

 government, dying for the want of irri- 

 gation water ; and 



"Whereas the cause for the deplorable 

 condition that now confronts the farmers 

 upon the Boise project is due to the in- 

 efficiency of the reclamation service and 

 the incompetency and neglect of the local 

 officials of the reclamation service by fail- 

 ing to store in the Deer Flat reservoir 

 during the fall of 1916 and the spring of 

 1917 sufficient water for the proper irriga- 

 tion of the lands ; therefore, be it 



"Resolved by the wa'ter users in mass 

 meeting assembled, That the officials in 

 charge of the Boise project and who are 



