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The Ag^ricultural Utilization of the Salt Marsh. 



BY JACOB G. I^IPMAN^ PH.D., DIRE:CT0R OF THE: NEW JERSEY 

 AGRICULTURAI, EXPERIMENT STATIONS. 



Land reclamation, a subject of growing interest in this State, 

 is as old as civilization itself. For this reason it might be worth 

 while to consider briefly the remarkable reclamation work which 

 has been accomplished by agricultural peoples in Asia and Europe 

 in their struggle for food. 



In China, for instance, there are many millions of acres of 

 land created by the silt carried down by the great streams within 

 historic times. Cities once located on the seaboard have been, 

 as it were, gradually moved inland until some of the towns are 

 now as many as twenty-five or thirty miles away from the coast. 

 That distance represents a tremendous acreage of dry land built 

 up by silt carried by the great streams. This land is, of course, 

 flat and but little above the level of the sea. Nevertheless, its 

 fine texture and high content of plant food make it very fertile. 

 The people of China, with infinite patience, have been struggling 

 to grow crops and to provide food for a large population on 

 land which the seas and the streams have been building in the 

 space of centuries. 



There are striking instances of land reclamation in Europe. 

 For instance, about 300,000 acres of land in the fens of Lincoln- 

 shire, England, have been made arable by diking and pumping. 

 Similarly, the polder or reclaimed marsh lands in Holland be- 

 came available after five to eighteen feet of water had been 

 removed by pumping over the dikes, and carried by the river 

 to sea. The Harlem Zee, whose reclamation was completed 

 in 1852 after continuous pumping of thirty-nine months, has an 

 area of 41,000 acres, and supports now a population of some- 

 thing over 20,000. More recently the government of Holland 

 authorized the reclamation of a portion of the Zuider Zee, com- 

 prising in all about one million acres. The proposed work is to 

 be completed in thirty-three years. It involves the expenditure 

 of $130,000,000; it anticipates an annual income of $28,000,000, 



