Santa Fe new Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1898-1951, 1900-12-03
BECLAIMING ARID LANDS.
The Possibilities of Government System
Of Irrigation as Applied to New
Mexico.
THE OLD SPANISH SYSTEM.
Chicago Record.)

CATION 70, 600, 900 acres of land in New
Mexico car be reclaimed and made into
farming and which would have no SUI
perior in the whole world"
This is the statement made by Mr..
P. E. Harroun, of Albuquerque, a C.vi!
engineer and one of the best-known ir-
rigation experts in the west and south
west. Mr.. Harroun emphasizes the
supplementary statement that to re-
claim this vast tract of land congress
must institute n control the irriga-
ton system. If the work be left to
private and corporate enterprise not
more than 1900, 900 acres can be re-
claimed.
There are so, 900, 900 squar acres of
land in New Mexico and only 600, 900 of
them under irrigation of any form. Ex-
cept in a few instances, these systems
of irrigation are of Spanish origin and
have been in vogue for the last 300
years. Mr.. Harroun says that he is
confident that the Indians used them
even before the Spaniards came here
from Old Mexico. That such systems
are unscientific and wholly inadequate
is obvious.
But even these crude and Anticipated
systems demonstrate the possibilities,
from am agricultural point Of view, of
New Mexico, if intelligence We're used
in the water distribution. 1t is a mis-
taken idea that New Mexico is a waste
of desert beyond the possibility of rec
lamation. Wherever lands have been
reclaimed and put to agricultural pur-
poses the higest results have been OBJ
tanned. Two and three, and in some
instances, four crops are raised. New
Mexican wheat was awarded a prize at
the Worlds Fair in 1898. Cereals, fruit
and vegetables raised on lane ven in
sufficiently irrigated compare ~favorably
with similar products of the hammer
states Of the country. Nor can it be
said that farming has been intelligently
assayed in this country, those who fol-
low it being in most instances humble
people without means, who are unable
by want of capital to prosecute it to its
full degree.
Irrigation in New Mexico" says
Mr.. Harroun, lis wholly confined to the
valley of the Rio Grande, the lower
Pecos, the headwaters of the Canadi-
an, and the upper portions of the val
legs of streams furnishing a perennial
water supply, leaving the vast bodies
of arabic lands between the sources of
supply and the trunk streams unim-
proved. Scientific development of the
water supply for irrigation has been
undertaken in but two sections of the
territory, on the lower Pecos by me
Pecos Irrigation and Improvement
company, and in the upper Canadian
district by the Maxwell land grant
company. Today these are the most
wealthy and prosperous sections of
New Mexico, thousands of acres being
IN cultivation, where before there was
little or none.
OLD SPANISH SYSTEM.
1.-THE old Spanish system" continued
Mr.. Harroun, 'is made by merely cut
ting a hole in the side of a bank
against which the river impinges, and
plastering it up with stone, grass and
brush, all of which is weighted Town
by heavy boulders. Through this cut
into a ditch the water of the river Is Iii
verified. There are no regulation gates
or sluices whatever. These bitches car
ry a surplus Of water, and as a con-
,,o 1901 xyoe&a ne vrotar
are excessive. The surplus water from
the irrigated field and the bitches is al
lowed to find its WI way to- the river,
and the result is that during irrigation
season, from April 1 to November I,
the roads are almost impossible and
nearly as much land is laid waste in
swamps as is in cultivation. Under
such a system of irrigation it is little
wonder that New Mexico, which has a
soil unsurpassed by that of any coun-
try on the globe, is contemptuously re-
ferred to as am arid desert"
New Mexico's natural water supply
has been deprecated by Colora 10 on
the north and Texas on the south. In
both of those states Intelligent irriga-
ton methods have diverted the waters
which nature intended for New Mexico.
But even where streams are absent,
water Is found in abundance al an av-
erage depth of fourteen feet below the
surface. This Is reached by artesian
wells, the water being pumped and
spread over the land by a small gaso-
line pump. Where this system has been
used land has been reclaimed at a cost
of 81 an acre.
That there are those who are willing
to put their money into irrigation sys-
tines in this territory Is evidenced by
the fact that an English syndicate with
a capital of 81, $780, 900 is already organ
ICED to build an international dam
across the Rio Grande.
With the government controlling the
irrigation system, NeW Mexico would
profit immeasurably by increased pop
development of resourc 20 and
thus directly benefit the whole country