The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-10-19
GREAT SALT LAKE DRYING UP
Irrigation Using Up the Waters That
Supply 1t.

|
Supply 1t.
Before another century nears 1T
end the Great Salt Lake, the mysteri
Gus, tideless inland sea, Graded fou
thousand feet above the level of oceans
may have disappeared into air. Fo
three decades it's shore line steadily
has been contracting, its depths con
tinually growing less, until to-day Its
ultimate destiny is written so legibly
that none deny the approach. The de-
claration that the waters are being
waited into the atmosphere is no fig
ure of speech. Evaporation is the foe
which in certain course of time, under
prevailing conditions, is going to trans
form the vast eXpanse of water into q
huge salt plain.
| Ages ago, thousands of years, the
| biologists say, Great Salt Lake, then a
sea covering the greater part, possibly
| the whole, of the great basin began to
| subside, but, strangely enough, the
| agency which now is fastening its
disappearance is distinctively of hui
man origin. OF more astonishing pur-
port still, the Mormons, who made the
valley of the Jordan widen from mar
| row strip of green to miles on miles of
fields Of unexpected fertility, are them
selves the people who have sacrificed
| the lake. That they may exist, that
| their rich tracts may continue to bear,
they deliberately are cutting off the
source of fresh water supply of the
mountain sea. Stagnant and helpless,
the lake is coming to lie at the COM
plete mercy of a pitiless sun.
Not many years ago geographers
and descriptive writer's took a fancy
to expressing the belief that the Great
Salt Lake was fed not alone by the
four rivers which empty into it, but
by hidden springs at it's bottom AS
long as no one took the trouble to
question the assertions they were ac-
cepted as facts, and by many persons
are still credited If there were springs
at intervals along the bed of the lake
it would not matter 50 much whether
the rivers continued to pour their con-
tents into the basin, but no springs ex-
list. They were called into the pages
of textbooks and into the accounts of
travellers to explain why the lake is
so exceptionally salt. 1t sounded much
better to say that nature, by one of its
freaks, had opened up the crust of
the earth at this point and sent vol
umes of briny water bubbling forth,
something after the style of geysers
and sulphur springs, than to make the
simple statement that the sadness, as
with the ocean, was due to the pro-
cess of evaporation on body of water
lacking a drainage outlet, and that its
excess was the consequence of alti-
tude. Plainly enough if the infloWing
water be diverted to other uses before
it reaches the lake, there will come
day when the salt deposit, which is
the result of the long continued war
fare between sun and water, will
stand exposed it's blanket gone.
The Mormons more, perhaps, than
any class of settlers in the arid dis
tricts of North America, have master
ed the science of irrigation. They have
been studying and experimenting for
over half a century. In all the time
since they entered their promised land
they have labored with the end of
making a little water do the most pos
sible good.
Unfortunately for the Great Salt
Lake, the lessons in economy in the
usage of irrigation rivulets have not
otiNtd W hcttlp pdCc Will lllb lucItdSe |
in population and the consequent ne
cessity of the continued reclamation
of arid land All the water for the ir- |
rigation of the Jordan Valley-the |
Great Salt Lake stake of the Mormon |
church. as it is ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS |
come from the rivers which feed the |
lake. They are the Jordan itself, con-
Meeting the fresh water of Utah Lake
with the larger body; Weber River,
which has it's source in the foothills |
Of the Uintah Mountains and flows |
northward winding close to Ogden be-
fore it empties into the lake; Ogden
river, smaller stream, which paral-
els the Weber for the latter half of the
Journey, and the Bear river, which
drains the Great Bear Lake at the
north.
The Bear river is subject to irriga-
ion demands of the Genties as well
rs the Mormons, since more of it's
course is through Idaho than Utah,
out the Weber and the Jordan are
wholly within the Mormon sphere of
agricultural influence. While the Gen
lies divide the city poulations of Utah
With the Mormons, they do not COM
|
riots. They own the mines in the
but these need no water
or irrigation. Hence it is that the
Iormons have themselves to thank for
he lakes recession.
1t has come to pass that at the dry
st season of the year the Weber dis |
harges but tiny streamlet into the |
AXE. The Jordan and the Bear both |
rain lakes which in turn are fed by
streams; hence their flows
re larger than that of the Weber,
hough insignificant in comparison to
What they once We're or what they ,
would be again should irrigation cas-
als and itches cease to claim their
ontents.
1t would seem at first thought that
he fate of Utah Lake would be iden-
ical with that of the Great Salt Lake.