Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1893-06-16
IMPORTANT DEVELOPMENT.
Fifty Thousand Acres of Dry Land
to Be Irrigated.
What the New Mexican Does for Its
Home Patrons.

The New MEXICAN yesterday after much
questioning secured some good data from
Mr.. J.J. Seymour and Mr.. Julius M.
Howells, consulting engineer of the Chi
cago Municipal Investment company.
Mr.. Seymour is the president of the
Fresno, Cal, Water Works company, and
thoroughly experienced in and conversant
with the needs OF an irrigation plant.
"Mr. Seymour, what do you consider
the prospects Of the Nambe project?"
81 think it is perfectly practicable, and
may be put in operation at a less cost than
is usual with such works. The cost, of
course, will look large when stated, but
when compared with reservoirs through
out the arid region it will be seen that
the work is not costly. When compared
with the benefit to the irrigable lands the
expenditure is we'll within reason"
"Mhers are your reservoirs to be To-
| cated!"
Mr.. Howells answered: "The woods
are full Of them. We have good sites all
the way up the stream. The catchment
basins will cover in some instances from
400 to 800 acres with mav,.num depth
of eighty feet. You can see what series
of reservoirs of this area will mean when
you compare them with tho one now near
ly completed in the Santa Fe canon. The
Nambe flows three or four times more
water than the Santa Fe; but the problem
there is of entirely different character.
On the Nambe the timber has been
burned off and offers no more protection
to the winter snow than 80 many tele-
graph poles. On the Santa Fe the
timber is in good condition and there are
now acres Of snow three and four feet
deep, which insures q good flow of that
creek. In the early Spring the Nambe
waters go off in a hurry and do no good
to the crops or anything else. Our res
ervoir will catch all this waste water and
preserve it, and they will be constructed
of such capacity that we will have water
to spare after the irrigation season is
over"
"Mr. Seymour, you have been over the
ground and can make an approximate
estimate of the area that will he irrigated
from this new project. Will you give your
opinion on that subjtct?"
"The reservoirs will serve 10000 acres
with plenty of water, and these will be 80
constructed that no existing water rights
will be interfered with. In fact, they will
be improved. We will store only the
waste water as it may be termed. We
have not as yet made detailed survey,
and are reluctant to state our opinions,
but am pretty certain of that much.
Practical work will probably begin next
month";"
Mr.. Howells then stated some of the
difficulties experienced with the Santa Fe
reservoir. Said he: 'We used at times
two feet of manure TO thaw the ground,
but that did not work. Then VIC took big
steel bars and drove them in under the
frost and tore the ground out as with n
lever. The excavation last winter was
harder than rock work. That is the rea-
son that our work was somewhat delayed.
To-day, however, we are making the new
connections with the city water mains,
and the people can count on good ser.
vice and supply of water. Our labor has
been enormous, and feel really elated
over the success"
Messrs. Howells and Seymour leave to-
day for the east. They will stop at Las
Vegas, thence 60 to Chicago to consult
with the fnanciers of the scheme, and
then spend short time in New York,
from whence they will return direct to
Santa Fe to begin active work. The
successful prom otion of these immensely
important Improvements is the work OF
the New MEXICAN. 1t is happy to herald
this good news to its patrons.