San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1888-09-17
REClAIMiNG WASTE REGIONS BY
MEANS OF IRRIGATION.

Agricultural Lands Of Colorado Which
May Be Made Immensely Productive.
Aztec Canals and Irrigation bitches.
The Rain Belt-Farmers' Testimony.
Mr.. T. c. Henry. formerly of Kansas,
and now one Of the most prominent men
in Colorado, who has been instrumental
in building several large canals In the
state, in discussing this question, says:
"Of the 40, 900 square miles of the terri
tory in this state east of the foothills less
than 5000 square miles are actually and
| systematically formed. 1t is my deliber
ate conviction that were all the water of
all the streams covering these plains alb
solutely preserved for domestic and irri-
eating purposes and applied with the
skill and economy displayed even in India
or Egypt. we could irrigate and make
| fruitful every acre of this immense area
an area capable of supporting an agri-
cultural population, urban and rural. Of
| 5000, 900 people, and yet 1t would be less
Belgium or the agricultural sections of
| France.
1.-THE area east of the mountains Is
practically all agricultural Land, and if
peopled as densely as is Belgium, would
contain population of more than $780,
900 of people. Or if provided with water
for irri cation, skillfuIyapplied, each forty
acres would support family of five per-
sons, aggregating a population of more
than 100000, not including the directly
dependent urban population. On the
same basis, the great San Luis valley
would sustain population Of 100000
the San Juan country in the southwest
nearly 1000 900; the Gunnison and the
Lower Grande, $50, 900, and the White, the
| Yampah and the almost unknown North
west, 100000 more. Before the close
of another century there will have been
elaborated a system of agriculture sur
passing that wonderful civilization which
Moorish power planted in the irrigated
valleys of Spain ten centuries ago, main
tanning the millions then populating our
grand commonwealth. There are not less
than &c, 900, 900 acres of agricultural lands
in this state which only need the applica-
ton of irrigation to be made as valuable
and productive as any already cultivated.
Carry these same predictions into west
ern Nebraska and Kansas, into Wyoming
and New Mexico, Idaho, Utah and
throughout the west, by utilizing the
waste waters saved in reservoirs, and the
| future greatness of the west Is almost in
conceivable. These things are possible.
| The ruins of the Aztecs and Pueblo In
dams, and great nations that are only
known in the dim past by the desolation
of mighty cities, tell US how densely pop
ulated were vast regions in the west in
an almost unknown antiquity. With
| these ruins are old canals and irrigation
bitches, and in some of them there is said
to have been used kind of cement that
is now lost art. These ruins are found
in arid sections where it would have been
impossible for great population and
cities to have thrived without vast irri-
CATION schemes. These great nations
have been swept away. Howl No one
knows, but from the dim borderland of
that almost hidden antiquity there come
up facts that when first considered seem
almost like dream. But it is history,
and let history repeat itself. The public
domain will soon be thing of the past,
and the present must look to the future,
and if this great water question is grasped
by our statesmen as it should be, it will
lay the foundation for still new and
mighty commonwealth.
Is the rain belt gradually moving west
ward2 This is a much disputed question.
Irrigating bitches make more surface
water, and hence there Is more evapora-
ton. That proposition cannot be denied,
although it must be admitted that the
rain does not always fall in the same To-
cality where the water was taken up by
evaporation. 1t is also claimed by some
that tree planting does not materially in
crease the rainfall.
IntbeJanuarE number of Science, Henry