The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1893-11-16

channel.
Mr.. President fear l do not pos
sess that faculty SO largely developed
in some of our political speakers of
striving to say things that will please
their audience while they are often
unmindful as to the truth of their
statements, and yet l would not have
you think me a calamity bowler. Al
! low me to state, therefore, before l
begin to criticise your irrigation sys-
TENS that L fully appreciate the ex-
allied position which Salt Lake county
occupies in the irrigated west If l
/ had the time and ability, l might re-
mind you of natures many gifts in the
way Of mild winters, cool July even
ings, long-continued sunshiny days,
unexcelled scenery and an invigorating
salt sea wave to battle in when the
days work is done. From an irriga-
ton standpoint, the location could not
be much improved upon. Your cult
waited fields in the eastern part of the
county extend well up to the base of
the Wasatch, from which range they
are easily and cheaply watered by the
numerous creeks which flow there
from. The middle and western por-
tons are watered by the large canalF
from the Jordan and possess a soil
made rich by the sediment deposited
upon the bottom of what once was a
greater salt lake than that which now
exists. 1t is here that they raise nine
tons of alfalfa and SO tons of sugar
beets per acre. This part of Utah is
not for sale. When l think of the 1900
irrigated farms, containing $4,000 acres,
and producing annually crops to the
value of three-quarters of a million
dollars, or at the rate at $27 per acre,
and comuare these figures with the
best county in Idaho, whose annual
yield per acre is worth less than SO
per acre; with the best county in New
Mexico, whose annual yield is worth
less than SO per acre; with the best
county in Nevada, whose annual yield
is worth less than SIS per acre, and
with the best county in Wyoming
whose annual yield is worth less than
S13 per acre, cannot but feel proud of
Utah's first born.
The productiveness of this vicinity
is due to the application of water
rather than to the fertility of the soil
Without water the annual yield in
most places would not be worth the
harvesting. 1t is true that land with
out a water right is valuable, but it is
owing to its proximity to a city and
not to its value for dry farming. And
yet, Notwithstanding all these facts,
there is every reason to believe that at
least SO per cent. of the available water
supply of this county is wasted. You
will understand that I DO not refer to
the high water in spring, but to the
July, August and September flow
that fertile belt which extends from
Brigham on the north to the Jordan
narrows on the south, reaches as a rule
to the very base of the Wasatch range
and is watered by some thirty or more
mountain streams besides Ogden and
Weber hoc
tied along the upper edge of this belt
vast accumulation of debris from
the mountains, in many places several
hundred feet in depth, and over this
porous surface the waters from the
many small canyons must flow before
they reach the farms to be irrigated.
Last summer l made a large num-
Der OF tests to determine approximate
ly, at least, the percentage of water
that was lost through seepage and
evaporation in these mountain streams
while flowing from the canyons to the
various farms which they Watered. Let
me give you the result of one or two
of these tests which are Characters
tic of all. Near the eastern boundary
of Weber county there is a canyon
with its accompanying creek which
flows through some of the richest ag-
ricultural land of that county, but its
X. L
of going up to measure this creek in
June of 80 but the volume was so
great that I could not make any meas
urement- [ went up again in January
of 81 and there was not enough to ir-
rigate Temple square. Last July
visited it again and found the creek
bed dry at its mouth. A few hundred
feet within the canyon 1 found a lit
tie water which gradually increased
until l came to a spring one-Quarter of
a mile farther up. This l measured
bic foot per second. Above this spring
the creek bed was again dry but the
water soon appeared and I traced it
on for. a half mile or more and OBJ
tanned by measurement IL cubic feet,
making a total of pa cubic feet, enough
to irrigate 200 acres, whose yield
might readily sell for $1,000. Take an
other case in Davis county, AMI by the
way if Davis county is in urgen. need
of anything, it is water. Nearly east
of Kaysville Haynt creek enlerges
from the mountains and likes scores of
others, it is allowed to flow over
coarse, gravelly materials down a steep
descent to water the farms below, 5ut
only a fraction reaches the farms. by
a series of measurements taken last
July 1 found the loss to be fully so
per cent. in flowing to the middle sec
ton. In this county you have begin
ming at the north, City creek. Butte
creek, Immigration creek, Parley's
creek, Mill creek, and the Cotton
woods, ali mountain streams, torrents
in May and June, but of insufficient
flow in August and September, and
each one losing its large percentage
of the vital fluid from the time it
leaves its rocky bed in the canyon I'M
til it enters the furrow of the irriga-
tor. Let me tell you also that this loss
is in nearly every case permanent that
is when the water once sinks on the
comes again to the surface at an ele-
walton high enough TO be again util-
lied. Then again nearly all the
bitches leading from these creeks are
very steep. Time and again I have
been afraid of getting the current me-
ter broken by the small rocks borne
by the rapid current. 1t is impossible
for any sediment to coat the sides and
bottom of these bitches; they are
more porous now than when first con-
At Wizard, in Box Elder
county, they paved their bitches with
cobble rock, filing the spaces with
clay and crude lining saves them
hundreds of dollars worth of water an
nually
I do not claim that we can save and
utilize all OF the available water sup
ply, but 1 do assert that we can add
annually to Utah's agricultural pro-
ducts at least $1.0OO,000 by a compar-
atively small expenditure in the way
of reconstructing old bitches, lining
the same with clay puddle,
concrete. rock and lumber, or
by pipes. which will prove
most economical in the end. Take
your Little Cottonwood for example;
there are believe about thirteen
bitches in all taking water from that
creek varying in length from a mile
or two to eight or ten and over, but
n,,l,r FIVE hara 1at.inr RIGHTS that iC the