PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 55 



concentrated their attention upon the production of milk, 

 and other dairy produce for local consumption, the land 

 being of a type considered unsuitable for the growth of 

 fruit trees, although with irrigation, it can be made to 

 produce satisfactory fodder crops. The control of this area 

 was in 1913 handed over to the Water Conservation and 

 Irrigation Commission; it consists of only about 970 irrigable 

 acres with added dry areas, totalling slightly over 4,000 

 acres, on which are about 80 settlers. 



Both the Hay and Wentworth areas, however, dwindle 

 into insignificance compared with the Murrumbidgee Irri- 

 gation Areas, which are at present passing through the 

 minor troubles incidental to such a scheme, but which at 

 the same time give promise of developing into prosperous 

 and contented settlements. 



This scheme was talked of by politicians and discussed 

 in the public press for many years before it actually came 

 into being. It involved the erection of a storage dam in 

 the Murrumbidgee Gorge at Burrinjuck, capable of holding 

 upwards of 750,000 acre feet of water, and the development 

 of a complete settlement to contain 100,000 people on the 

 plains of Narrandera, which were, practically speaking, 

 uninhabited. 



So much has been written of the great dam at Burrinjuck, 

 that it is perhaps unnecessary to refer to the matter at 

 length here, but the following figures as to its dimensions 

 will, no doubt, be of interest. 



The length of the crest of the dam exclusive of curvature, 

 will be 752 feet. Its height from the lower level of the 

 foundations at R.L. 949*53 to the top of the parapet, will be 

 about 236 feet. Its greatest width at the base is 168 feet, 

 at the top 18 feet. On either side there will be two spill- 

 way weirs several hundred feet in length. The surface 

 area will be no less than 12,784 acres when the reservoir 



