The Evening statesman. [volume] (Walla Walla, Wash.) 1903-1910, 1904-04-06
GOVERNMENT IRRIGATION.

The beneficent results of the British
protectorate over Egypt are suggested
by the accomplishment of the great
dam for irrigating purposes at Assou-
an, which has a storage capacity of a
billion tons of Nile water, with ample
locking facilities for river traffic, and
will immensely increase the agricul-
tural productivity of lower Egypt
1t is proposed to continue the benefi-
cent work of simplifying the supply of
water for irrigating purposes by the
construction of a great storage reser-
which will also improve the naviga-
ton of the Blue Nile, and constructing
Nyanza, to supply the needs of the
dwelers on the Nile above Khartoum.
The irrigating works in India are now
constructing on a large scale, in view
of their demonstrable value as proven
tives of death dealing famine.
The revival of practical interest in
irrigation, as necessity i'll arid and
semiard regions for plant growth, is
feature of the growing intelligence Of
men who are now vastly improving
upon the methods of the ancient irri-
gators, after scientific principles.
One of the greatest and most i'm
portant processes undertaken by our
own government is the work Of re-
claiming a possible 200,000,OO0 acres.
out of the 470,OOO,O00 acres of the arid
region in this country, for agricultural
operations. The government has now
wrought out it's plans to the extent of
proceeding with the work in Wyoming,
Utah, where the MOrmons have al
ready changed the face of a large por-
ton of the state by irrigating opera
tons; in Arizona, California, Idaho,
Nevada, Kansas, Oregon and Wash
ington. Surveys are now in progress
predatory to the construction of costly
works for the utilization of the waters
of the Colorado river, in southeastern
California; the utilization of three
rivers in Colorado, whose waters now
go to waste, and similar works in the
other states named, where land now
characterizable as desert, can be
made to blossom as the rose Pri-
vate enterprise has already spent mil
lions in storage reservoirs in the arid
and semiarid region. In the Dakotas
good service providing storage reser-
voirs. One distributing reservoir in
Colorado, covering 7O5 acres, holds
$50, 100000 cubic feet of water, and the
MERGED dam in California, is sixty feet
high and covers $50 acres, while the
!Sweetwater dam in that state is nine
|ty feet high and the reservoir covers 725
Acres Of water. Some dams hold
water forty feet deep and they are
constructed of solid masonry.
Since congress has committed such
work to the government engineers it
will steadily progress. No miracle Of
water producing may be expected, but
slowly and persistently, arabic and
productive land for the people will be
supplied where now food plant growth
is impossible. The irrigating ditch is
the magical transforming agent. Hand
nj hand with irrigation comes the ne
cessity for forest protection at tie
water sources, that the rivers and
| creeks which make the life giving flow
of water for plant nutrition may be de-
Tended from the hand of the human de-
stroyer. Forest conservation and irri-
cation are twin blessings. The latter
is impossible without the former.