WATER STORAGE AND CANALIZATION. 321 
supplying water to 90,344 acres. Experience quickly showing 
the great advantages of this system, which from 20 acres pro- 
duced in some instances as much as 2,000 acres had yielded without 
= se has since led to their construction on a much larger scale. 
Stes 5 ; " ; Denese 
Company’s canal irrigates over 15,000 acres, and when its 
extension to San Joaquin city is completed it is estimated that it 
will irrigate 325,000 acres, which at 20 bushels of wheat to the 
acre (a low average for this valley) would produce 6,000,000 
bushels of wheat from ground which before hardly produced 
60,000 bushels. In 1875 this canal was 38} miles long, 55 feet 
wide, 4 feet deep, and had a fall of 1 foot to the mile. It was 
then proposed to extend it 40 miles, with a grade of 4 foot to the 
ile, The King’s River Irrigation Company's Canal is 30 feet 
wide, 3 feet deep, and has a fall of 1 foot to the mile. The supply 
is considered sufficient for irrigating 300,000 acres. The Fresno 
ul is 10 miles, 40 feet wide, and has a grade of +5 foot toa 
mile ; it is supplied from a reservoir 14 mile long, 100 feet wide, 
and 10 feet deep, and is estimated to irrigate 0 acres. 
bend, and runs nearly parallel with the river below the bend ; it 
1s 30 miles long, 35 feet wide, and 3 feet deep, with 1 foot grade 
re 
niches constructed, at a cost of over £3,200,000, by different large 
. Companies employed in hydraulic sluicing the celebrated Blue 
. Lead and other deep gravel drifts on the western flank of the 
— Nevada Mountains. Some of these evidence considerable 
ta and ingenuity in their design and construction, having 
@ dust. Another h draulic company washed 22 
SO dirt in six dap, “hich a water supply of 4,000,000 of 
gold irt only contained about one ng’s worth bie: 
Mas yore’ cubic foot; and though the cost of wages and water 
whet 7 High they realized a profit of 2,350 dollars—a proof 0 
ig) all quantity of gold will return in such deep drifts by a 
17... -PPlication of hydraulic power. — d 
re let me pause in my brief and hurried review of the gran 
A 
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