The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1889-10-11

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country bears parched and brown
aspect, making the area occupied by
the verdant groves and Vineyards ap
pear like an oasis in desert.
Through the months of July,
August and September the weather
is uniformly warm with occasional
days interspersed when the Their
mometer in the shade on the south |
side of the house will show tenn
perature of 40 deg. or lis deg. F.,
but on account Of the great dryness
Of the atmosphere, the sense of ply
steal discomfort is no greater than at
the Islands when the mercury gets
up to 80 deg, and mechanics and
laborers at work out-of- doors suffer
no evil effects from the exposure.
Such thing as sunstroke is almost
unheard of.
Southern California is a land of
glorious sunshine. Throughout the
greater part of the year the king of
day unveiled by clouds or mists,
floods the earth with its benefcent
and health giving radiance, and
numberless are the instances where
sufferers from consumption, asthma,
rheumatism and other diseases, who
have come here from beyond the
Rocky Mountains, have found health
and comfort and length of days.
Here are to be found doctors and
lawyers, clergymen and teachers,
merchants and clerks, men repre-
senting every trade and profession,
who having abandoned the life for
which they have been especially
trained, either from compulsion or
choice, have come to this land of the
orange and the vine, and are here
enjoying a life of Arcaaian comfort,
free from harassing cares and de-
pressing toll. Many for the sake of
the out-of- door life and exercise per
form the whole, or part of the light
and pleasant labor requisite to the
maintenance Of their orchards and
vineyards, while others supplement
the revenue afforded by their ranches
by the gains Of business and profess
sional life in town.
SOIL AND IRRIGATION.
The soil of Riverside is a decom-
posed granite, of a chocolate color,
and of varying degrees of disintegra-
ton, from that which is as fine as the
best of Hawaiian soils, although al
ways containing a sufficient proper
tion of grit to scour a pillow, to
| quality which seems to be composed
largely of sand. The sandy soil is
naturally less fertile than the other,
but is more easily cultivated, as it
does not bake after irrigation as the
adobe soil is inclined to do. To one
accustomed to the careful and econ
omical methods of irrigation in vogue
at the Islands, the system in general
use here appears in the highest de-
gree extravagant and wasteful, and
yet as it is the result of fifteen years
of the experience of careful and in
telligent men, one would hardly ven
ture to say that it is not the best
plan that could be devised under the
circumstances, without first showing
by practical demonstration the su-
periority of some other method.
Irrigation usually begins about the
first of April and is continued until
the first of November. During those
seven months it is necessary to repeat
the operation about every four or five
weeks. The ground is prepared for
irrigation a day or two in advance
by blowing shallow burrows from the
highest side of the orchard to the
lowest, unless the fall is regarded as
being too great, in which case they
are run diagonally across the field.
The burrows are about two feet
apart, and down each one is turned
a small stream of water from the
ditch or fume which conveys the
water along the upper edge of the
field. The amount of water in each
furrow is so small that several hours
are usually required for it to reach
the lower end, but after that, the
water being allowed to run forty
eight hours in each furrow, there is a
constant and absolute waste of the
precious fluid. amounting in the ag-
gregate to from twenty-five to sew
enty-tive per cent. of the whole
amount of water ordered and paid for.
In other words the present water sup
ply which is now barely able to sup
ply the demands for an area of 1000
or 5000 acres, would, if there were
no waste, be ample for an area of
10000 to $4,000 acres, or more. The
water supply, however, is being
constantly augmented by means of
increasing the number of artesian
wells near the heads of the canals,
as we'll as by cementing the canals
to prevent loss from leakage, and it
is possible that in the near future
supply far in excess of all possible
requirements may be obtained by
the use of reservoirs In which shall
be the superabundant water of win
ter and spring. Should this how
ever never be accomplished it is
self evident proposition that there
must be greater economy practiced
in the use of water, or else a large
proportion of the total irrigated
area of Riverside some "a, 900 acres
must remain unimproved and com
paratively valueless. From the
standpoint of the water users at any
rate, the problem of more econom-
ical system of irrigation is an import
ant one, as the owner of a ten-acre
orchard who now expends say one
hundred dollars year for water,
I