The San Francisco call., 1898-03-08
IRRIGATION
 IS BOOMING One Result of the Dry Season in the Salinas
 Valley.
Thousands of Acres of Land Will Be Made to Produce
 Sugar Beets.
{" An Example of Energy Unsurpassed in California;" Says Inspector
 Shinn of Berkeley.

BERKELEY, March This dry year has had the one good effect of turning the attention of agriculturists to the Importance of irrigation" de- clared Inspector Charles H. Shinn of the university experiment stations to-
 day. MT. Shinn has just returned from a visit to the Paso Robles ex- pertinent station, where the rainfall for the season so far has been only 3.24 inches, as against 15 inches for last year. ''If the season continues dry" he said, ''in order to carry orchard and vineyard through, the trees and vines
 will have to be pruned very closely and the cultivation will have to be very thorough. Every bit of moisture
 will be needed, and I have instructed
 the men to blow the ground a little at a time, and harrow it immediately af- terward in order to keep the mois- ture.
 '.At Kings City, where I stopped on my way back" continued the inspector,
 T saw an example of energy in the matter of irrigation that has undoubt- edly never been surpassed even in our wonderful California. Four or five irrigating schemes had been projected
 on various big ranches in the Salinas Valley, but none of the schemes were
 intended to be put into operation until next year. AS the winter has mostly ! passed by with but little rain, how
 ever, and the indications pointed to an
 unusually dry season, preparations
 were made on the Spreckels ranch to irrigate immediately. In three weeks they will have put in place an immense centrifugal pump that cost $l5,O00, to pump water from the Salinas River for
 de i of acres of beet sugar land on. the
 ranch. The work has neceSsitated the 1 employment of hundreds of men, and | while prospects are disheartening ln | agricultural regions all over the State | there is an unprecedented activity in and about Kings City. Probably three 1 or four thousand dollars a week are being spent in wages and a score of | new houses are being hurriedly erected l in the town.
 | MT. William Winterhalter, formerly ' of the Agricultural Department staff | here at the university, has been placed 1 in charge of the Spreckels ranch as 1 superintendent With this vast irri- gating project to be rushed through. in l addition to looking after the two ranches and the dairy and stock farm, he is kept on the rush. AS soon as the water is got on the land the blow ling will commence. Two immense steam EpIows have been. recently purchased for the ranch. The big traction engines | were too heavy to go over the county bridges between Salinas and Paso Ro- | bles, so they had to be forwarded by
 rail. The beet sugar industry in the I Salinas Valley, as well as everywhere else that it has been tried in Cali l fornia, is having wonderfully rapid I and successful development"
 i Inspector Shinn believes that the Sa- ] linas Valley offers the greatest oppor- i tunities for irrigation to be found in the l State. "The Salinas River would sup | ply water enough to amply irrigate the l whole Salinas Valley, which is nearly
 100 miles long and averages in width l from three to fifteen miles, Most of the | soil is admirably adapted to beet rais- l ing. I have seen land in the valley cov-
 cred with alluvial soil sixty feet deep. l. All it wants is water. The supply of
 water is inexhaustible, and if irrigation | facilities were sufficiently developed the
 whole valley between Bradley and Sa- l linas, seventy-five miles in extent, | could be watered. The elevation at 1 Bradley is 539 feet and at Salinas A | feet. If the water were pumped to the 1 higher elevations at the sides of the valley near Bradley nearly all of the
 valley clear down to Salinas could be
 used for raising beets The possibili-
 ties of the Salinas Valley are simply
 wonderful.
 "Without doubt there will be a | great development in transportation fa-
 cilities in that region. A narrow-gauge
 road now extends from Watsonville,
 where the Spreckels beet sugar factory
 is situated, to Salinas. To my mind it | is only a question of time when the road will be pushed on up the valley so
 as to take in Soledad and Kings City.
 Next Saturday a farmers institute
 will be held at Soledad, where the Sal l vation Army settlement has been es-
 tablished. Miss Mary Mclean, who was formerly a student in the agri-
 cultural department at Berkeley and | is now one of the leaders in the Saliva I tion Army colony, will conduct the
 meeting. Professor Jaffa will go down l from Berkeley and Superintendent Winterhalter of the Spreckels ranch
 will take an active part. Beet sugar
 raising and irrigation will be given par-
 ticular attention.