The San Francisco call., 1895-05-22
RICHEST OF ALL VALLEYS.
What the New Railroad Direct
orS Saw in the San
Joaquin.
WEALTH OF WATER AND SOIL
Thomas Magee Gives His Observa-
tions After a Trip the Entire
Length.

In letter lately written for the CALL,
from the snow in the Sierra Nevada, L
made the assertion that those mountains
were the most valuable lands in the State.
because they hold the snow from which
the rivers of our two great valleys derive
their waters. The truth of that assertion
can only be fully appreciated by those who
make a general survey of the more arid of
those two valleys. Such survey was re-
Gently made by six of the directors of the
San Joaquin Valley Railroad. They were
Charles Holbrook, Robert Watt, John D.
Spreckels, Captain A. H. Payson, Leon
Sloss and Thomas Magee. Claus Spreckels
with two directors, also made a similar
survey about month ago.
On the last trip, the districts between
Fresno and Hanford, Delano, Visalia and
the east side were inspected. The Han.
ford district in Kings County was espe-
cially interesting. Nine inches of rain
would be a heavy fall there in wet season
hence, if the local rainfall was the only de-
pendence for moisture, no crops, other
than haphazard grazing, could be counted
upon in any season.
In short, between nearly hopeless aridity
on the one hand and soil in many places
spoiled with alkali on the other, the region
would be nearly wholly desert. 1t is
now one of the richest regions in the
valley, because it has been made inde-
pendent of local rainfall by irrigation from
mountain rivers. Irrigation has not done
more for the Hanford region than for
every district in the valley where water
has been thus used, and only cite that
region because it was naturally one of the
most arid of them all.
Hanford was not the richest of the dis
tricts through which the directors drove,
because it has not vet by cultivation. got
rid of all its patches of alkali; neverthe-
less, nowhere in the whole valley will its
crops, either of wheat, oats or barley, or of
alfalfa, grapes, pears, aprlcots, peaches
prunes or almonds, be greatly surpassed.
Successful farming results from irrigation
are due to the one great main source of
water supply-the Sierra Nevada-and
therefore to those mountains the San
Joaquin Valley is practically indebted for
all OF its developed wealth. True, the sun
shine and soil we're there, but the sun heat
was Intellectual and the soil barren, until
| water artificially applied made an unsur-
passedly fruitful agricultural marriage.
! Nor is this all; even country with
ample rainfall would derive great benefit
| from irrigation, for, as we all know, rain
| frequently fails to fall when its descent
would apparently do the most good, while
| in the case of irrigation, the water NAV be
| applied at just the right moment, and
! thus the very best results can be obtained.
| The question, and it is very interesting
and important one, will here be asked,
| whether the whole of the land of the great
valley has been irrigated. The answer is
no; not over 400, 900 acres of it have been
watered, while at least 2,000, 900 to 5000, 600
acres yet remain to be irrigated, and even
OF the remainder, but small portion is
necessarily desert land. 1t will thus be
seen to what vast empire irrigation has
not. yet been applied in the San Joaquin
Valley-lands as easily and cheaply sus-
ceptlbIe OF being brought under the do
minlon of that benefcent process as those
already rescued by it from hopeless or par
tial sterility, and brought to the highest
stage of agricultural wealth. Think of
trees with load on each of 1000 to 1900
pounds of prunes, as they have had near
Visalia, and of raisin and wine grape vines
yielding, as in exceptional cases they do
around Fresno, twenty tons of grapes to
the acre, the average frequently being
eight tons.
These results have been obtained in older
districts around Fresno and Visalia, not
now from full, but only from partial irri-
cation. And this is one of the most in
teresting and profitable facts connected
with the system.
After district has been irrigated from
five to six years it is no longer necessary
bitches, for by that time lateral seepage
has wet the whole soil and the moisture,
originally fifty or sixty feet below the sur
face, permanently remains at depth of
from five to six feet. Irrigation is thus
reduced to half its running expenses, be-
cause it is reduced to half its labor, while
in addition the quantity of water needed
G n mr. hIrd hA
originally needed. One hundred and fifty
thousand acres of land around Fresno
now need sub-irrigation only, that is, irri-
CATION in the main bitches by lateral seep-
age.
l have stated how much land in the San
Joaquin Valley can be that has not vet
been irrigated and the question will, there
fore, naturally be asked whether these
lands continue in their naturally arid con-
dition because there is not now enough
unused water left with which to irrigate
them. And here is the place to speak of
the enormous supplies of life-giving and
wealrh-creating water possessed by the
Sierra Nevada.
I am assured by those best competent to
judge that there is at least double the
water still going to waste in these Sierra
rivers that would be necessary to irrigate
all of the still dry lands between Stockton
and Bakersfield. Seven of these rivers are
O1 mdJeSt1c HOW. luey are the Kern,
Kings, Kaweah, San Joaquin, Merced,
Tuolumne, Stanislaus and the Mokelumne.
From only two of these rivers systems of
irrigation at all commensurate with their
flow have so far been established, and vet
that flow seems to hav e been very little af.
fected by the water taken. Some idea of
the watery wealth still to be appropriated
for irrigation and of the work remaining
to be done in that connection may be
formed from these facts. The extent to
which the waters of these large rivers are
sure to be made serviceable for irrigation
purposes at once becomes apparent upon
examining the irrigating systems from
such lesser rivers as the Kaweah and Tule
rivers, to which the fertility of the Porter
vile, Visalia and Tulare districts is wholly
due.
And yet, while recognizing the immense
value of the waters of our great mountain
reservoirs for what has already been done
through their use, q fact should here be
stated to which I have never known atten-
tion to be called, and that is that the
greatest wealth of California does not lie
in its gold deposits, its kingly timber
belts, in the high average wealth of its
soil, or even in its ample supplies of water.
These are all immense SO1lrceS of natural