186 TEXi»S NATURE OBSERVATIONS AND REMINISCENCES. 



and while many of the remote 

 mountainous regions aie still in. 

 their primitive state — just about 

 the same as hundreds of years ago, 

 when the Indian, buffalo, panther, 

 bear and other wild animals roam- 

 ed about and haunted the forests 

 and rocky caverns, it is a notice- 

 able fact that in late years, in con- 

 sequence of the heavy immigration 

 and the building of railroads, those 

 regions have changed immensely. 

 After the first German settlers, 

 who had many a desperate en- 

 counter in early da^s with red- 

 skins and wild beasts, noticed 

 what immense fertile soil Texas 

 harbors, many of those wild prai- 

 rie refiions were soon converted in- 

 to blooming fields and gardens, 

 and not better testimony of this 

 high cultured state could be re- 

 corded to-day than the thriving, 

 industrious and beautiful towns 

 of Boerne, Comfort, New Braun- 

 fels, Fredericksburg, and others. 



But the flourishing neighboring 

 towns are not the only ones that 

 justly can be proud of their horti- 

 cultural achievements. Our own 

 City, at least in its close vicinity, 

 can also boast with no little pride 

 of its flourishing fields and truck 

 gaidens. 



Where once nothing but a dense 

 wilderness of cacti and underbrush 

 and mesquite existed around our 

 beautiful Alamo City, we now can 

 notice a widespread area of the 

 finest gaiden products imaginable. 

 All sorts of grain and garden pro- 

 ducts: corn, maiz, rice, sugar cane, 

 alfalfa, oats, rye wheat, okra, 

 lettuce, cabbage, spinach, turnip, s 

 onions, and also different varieties 

 of fruit trees, melons, pumpkins, 

 cucumbers, potatoes and various 

 other market goods can here be 

 seen in profusion. And not alone 

 during the hot summer months, 

 but even in the midst of the cold 

 winter, these gardens delight the 

 visitor with their diversity of 

 vegetation. 



Such is especially also the case 



with the truck gardens along the 

 romantic pecan groves south of 

 the San Antonio River up to Me- 

 dina, and including the United 

 States Observation gardens and 

 the Southwestern Asylum proper- 

 ty- 



And to our old townsman, F. F. 

 Collins and Mr. Brady the honor 

 is due of being the first who con- 

 ceived the happy idea of convert- 

 ing a vast cactus and mesquite 

 plain and eyesore into now flour- 

 ishing and blooming fields and 

 gardens, by aid of modern irriga- 

 tion facilities. Mr. Collins, in- 

 deed, must be a practical gardener 

 to have achieved such a success 

 in such a short time, and his fol- 

 lowers also have achieved wonder- 

 ful results with their irrigated 

 lands. Evidently, there exists an 

 immense subterranean water stra- 

 ta or basin in the surroundings of 

 of San . Antonio which furnishes 

 such enormous volumes of water 

 daily not alone to San Antonio 

 with its approximate population 

 of over 100,000 inhabitants, but 

 also to supply those and other irri- 

 gated fields in the western dis- 

 tricts of San Antonio ; and these 

 fields also consume immense vol- 

 umes of the purest water imagin- 

 able. , 



If one visits those fields, along 

 the Leona Road, passing near the 

 Union Slaughter House, it is no- 

 ticed that the first and so far lar- 

 gest irrigated farm extends beyond 

 or south of the slaughter houses, 

 from the old Pleasanton Road 

 westward, up to the nice villas 

 of Mr. Collins; and near -these 

 other ingenious investors also 

 have estalished irrigated farms, 

 which extend nearly up to the 

 Leona hills, or about six miles in 

 length, and some of the bare lands 

 have just now been successfully 

 supplied with artesian wells. 



The entire valley this side and 

 above Leona Creek will some of 

 these days — and in no long dis- 

 tance — be converted into one im" 



