Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1891-11-17
HOW TO DO IT.
The Query, How do These People
Live" Answered by Surveyor
General Hobart.
Sb beep, Farming and Fruits Personal
Observations made i'll Southern
Now Mexico.


SANTA FE, Nov. l6-As l spent the
month Of October travelling through
sou,hatu New Mexico, and as, after q day
passed in looking at lines and corners,
usually stopped for the night with some
farmer in the nelghborhood where / hap
pens1 to be, | think | can answer 1.-THE
question Of the traveller whose knowledge
OF this country is acquired by looking al
oar brown mesas through the car window
How do the people live"
A settler on new land, to be sure o
SUCCESS, must, in the first place, have
water to irrigate ten or more acres. Many
have within the last two or three years
located such farms on clear streams in the
mountain valleys or on plains watere d
by the same streams. If the intending
settler can not find such location to
suit him, he must buy land under an
established ditch paying therefor not
so exceed $40 per acre, and for water
from 81 to ~ per acre annually. This
expense will locate him near to schools
and the other advantages of settled
communities. As soon as the home
steader has built his adobe cabin, the
walls and roof of which are almost perfect
non'coNductOrs, efiectually shutting out
the summers heat and the winters wind,
he sOws few acres of alfalfa and perhaps
gets few sheep. These he and the
children care for until they increase to
| 900 and then he hires q native lad as
herder, paying him $25 per month. This
man, 50 darkly bronzed BY his solitary,
unsheltered life on the open plains, be-
meath tns burning sun, deserves this
highest commentator "He knows his
business" The care of 500 sheep will
worry states born American 10 death by
their prOwess to wander and their gener-
al inclination to run into danger,
but the born New Mexican Lerder walks
coolly in the middle of his flock of 1000,
and the distant head OF the flock moves
this way or that as voice directs, or
wheels and comes toward him az his
whistle, no matter what obstacle of water
or cliff intervenes. The settler who has
not only comfortable-he is becoming
rich. His expenses are light. His
herder starts out with the flock and
establishes his sheep camp in some
sheltered valley five or six miles away
from any water. There the grass is good,
as cattle seldom 60 so far from water
Every second or third day the flock feeds
down to water and back to camp to sleep.
rhe winter is 80 mild that the flock keeps
fat till spring with no food but the dry
natural grass still standing on the plains.
Butt in the spring the pinch comes. Dry
grass is getting scarce and grama grass
is slow in st%vting. Then the wise alG
humane owner orders his sheep home
and puts them on his twenty or thirty
acres of alfalfa pasture which has started
green and fresh, though no change can
yet be discerned in the color of the
plains. Here they remain during lamb
ing time, and in May return to the plains,
leaving their owner richer by the thou
sand lambs that 60 with them, and by
the wool they leave behind them which
brings in during the year 50 900 in cash.
The alfalfa field, besides the pasturage,
will produce four or five tons OF hay per
acre during the season.
Here then is paying business which
any careful man can work into There
is hardly an element of uncertainty about
it unless it be the water, and that is made
reasonably certain If it is contracted for
with responsible canal company. Even
if 81 per acre per annum is paid for the
water it will be repaid many times over
The farmers of large means in many
cases prefer the raising of mules or fine
horses or cattle. The farm of j. w. Poe.
at Roswell, is model stock farm, with
its 800 acres of alfalfa divided into twenty
acre pastures. His fat cattle and horses
are pleasure to see. Mr.. Poe says that
an acre of alfalfa will support three work
animals for year. doubt if anv spot
in the world can show greater productive
ness than this, which is com non in New
Mexico.
If one prefers farming pure and simple
he is sure of good market for his produce,
as the mines and the towns consume
more than can be raised here. Mr.. Lucky,
of Eddy, raised $50 tons of sorghum this
year as first crop on forty-four acres of
ground, selling the same for $3.50 per
ton, or $3.50. Alfalfa pays $40 or $50
per acre for hay. This is the great stand
by of the stock raiser. The alfalfa crop
is more to the new west than the corn
crop is to the Mississippi valley, and corn
does as well here as it does there.
But gardening pays much more to the
acre. The Pioneer Canal company in the
Pecos valley received $1,000 from the
onions shipped off from one acre of
ground All the onions produced can be
sold at wholesale at Eddy at 215 cents
per pound and the yield is 80 large that
that yields great profit.
Fruit raising is very successful. Eaisen
grapes, prunes, English walnuts and
other paying crops succeed perfectly.
Mrs. Casad, of Las Crucss, receives 81 200
per year for the privilege Of gathering her
twenty acres of apples.
My conclusion from personal observa-
tions is that in New Mexico there is
better opportunity for the EN- igrant from
the east than is to be found elsewhere in
the United States. If the new conner has