Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1905-11-09
Conquest Of ii: Great
American Desert
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SsGHaSSs

| country, and ii Will only be few
short years when she will rank with
any of the Northwestern States i'll
agricultural greatness. The recent act
of the Interior Department of the
| United States in setting aside $1,000
600 toward retaining three or four
| hundred thousand acres in the Milk
| River Valley is but beginning of a
much vastcr development of this sec
| ton as the needs grow apace. Al
/ ready the agricultural worth of this
to be famous valley has been ade-
.quately demonstrated in the results
which have followed the irrigation
works already established. 1t has
| been successfully proven that all kinds
Of agricultural products grow in great
abundance wherever irrigation is used
| The soil is naturally rich and needs
only moisture to make it yield prolific
ally The Great Northern Railways
main line practically cuts the valley
| in two. The fact that the government
has decided to begin immediate oper-
| atoms will prove a great incentive to
the people of that section who have
always believed in the future of their
country and will open to settlement a
vast area Of rich land to the home
seeker and investor.
| Professor Elwood Mead, the irriga-
ton expert of the United States De
partment of Agriculture, has borne en-
thusiastic testimony to the great capa-
biltes of the Sacramento Valley when
supplied with water, in canals and
bitches. for irrigation. He says, in an
official report. that its available water
supply should make it 'the Egypt of
the Western hemisphere"
The irrigable area of the valley is
estimated to he more than 3,O0O,000
acres. and calculations show that the
average annual discharge OF the Sac
ramento River at its mouth is suffi-
cient to frrigate every acre of this
great area Professor Mead, after re-
marking that it is sinful waste to
allow so much water to flow unused
to the sea. save for purposes of navi-
CATION, thus illustrates the nstOnish-
ing variety of the products of the
soil
| within a radius OF five miles in
the Sacramento Valley | saw every
product Of the temperate and semi
tropical zones which could call to
mind. Apples and oranges grew side
| by side, as did oak and almond trees.
There were olives from the South and
cherries from the North. A date palm
seemed equally at home with an alfal-
| ia meadow: figs and Tokay grapes
| were apparently as much in their ele-
ment as the fields of wheat or barley
or the rows OF Indian corn. some Of
feet in height All Of these could
have been grown on single acre, and
doubtless have BEEN
| In another report the same author-
ty expresses like view, as follows:
| In September last l saw part Of
the Sacramento Valley in its most I'M
lovely aspect One OF the trips taken
was from Chico to Willows, two towns
about thirty miles apart but the road
thirty-f1ve miles shrdlu cmfwyp shrd
Travelled made the distance about
thirty-five miles. We crossed what is
potentially one of the most fertile and
promising agricultural districts on this
continent. For scores of miles the
land rises by a gentle and uniform
slope from the Sacramento River to-
| W. lI al
ter would flow over every acre Of the
country traversed without requiring
much labor in its direction or skill in
the location of lateral bitches. The
plains OF I.ombardy are not better suit
ed to irrigation, nor the soil of the
these lands originally. For half
century they have been devoted to the
unremitting production Of cereal
crops. Each season the crop has been
harvested, the grain shipped away,
and the straw burned. and nothing
drawn. A more exhaustive form of
agriculture cannot he imagined. AL
though this surprising drain has gone
on for fifty years. it cannot continue
forever.
The absence of rainfall during the
harvest period is ono OF the great all
vantages of California. where the
needed moisture can be supplied by
irrigation. 1t is likewise one OF the
greatest obstacles to diversified agri-
culture where dependence is had on
rainfall alone. The natural opportu-
mites OF the district traversed are
equal to, if not greater than those OF
the country surrounding Riverside,
Cal. which has been appropriately
designated as the Garden Spot of
America" but difference in agricul-
tural ideas has produced Il correspond
ing difference In conditions.
The bonanza wheat farm and the
bonanza orchard We're in accord with
the spirit which from the first has
dominated the industries of CalifOr-
mia. 1t is State of vast enterprises
Men pride themselves on great under
takngs and doing whatever they UNI
dertake on a large scale Wheat can
be grown in this way. The man with
capacity for organization can look