Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-03-17
BIG MONEY IN WATER
Largest irrigation Project on
the Continent
NOW UNDER WAY IN CANADA
To Reclaim 1900, 900 Acres of Desert
Land
A LOOK AT THE bitches
Scheme Suggested by the Mormons of
British Northwest-Their Large
Beet Sugar Works.


CALGARY, Alberta.
BY all odds the biggest irrigation project
on the North American continent is now
under way In this province OF Alberta In
1902 all the irrigated lands of the United
States did not amount to 10oO00 900 acres.
BY this scheme Canada will redeem mil
lion and a half acres of semi-desert, and
that by private parties without government
aid. The work has been undertaken by
the Canadian Pacific railroad, which has
exchanged a part of its land grant for
Z. 100000 acres lying between here and Medi-
cine Hat OF this 100000 acres will be
put under water and the balance will be
sold to the irrigated land owners for pas
! ture and mixed farming. This tract of IT.
rigated lands is almost great all the
irrigated land of Colorado or California.
1t is more than twice that of Utah, Idaho
or Wyoming and many times that of any
OF her western state.
This work is now going on. One hun
dred and ten thousand acres are now ready
for the turning on of the water, and dOu-
hle that amount will be added this
wear The project will be handled in blocks
of /, 900 600 acres EACH and IL will be con-
tinued until the whole tract is redeemed
and settled. Altogether, 1t means supply
ing homes to something like 30 900 families,
and with the towns and other industries
which will be built up along the line IT.
ultimately means the addition of about
300 0C0 people to Canada's population
In the Great American Desert.
The lands to be redeemed are a part Of
what was once known as the Great Ameri-
can Desert. This runs northward through
the western part of the United States and
on into Canada. There is more water
here than in our tributary country but
there are dry seasons, which make the
lands unfit for ordinary farming, although
winter wheat is now being raised on
much of It, For the past fifteen years the
Canadian government has had engineers
at work taking the levels, measuring the
streams and locating reservoirs. From
such surveys 1t has been found that there
are 100000 acres of semi-arid land which
need irrigation occasionally If they are TO
be used for farming. The government en-
gineers estimate that 100000 acres can
easily be reclaimed, and that they Will
have an unfaillng supply of water from
the Saskatchewan and its tributaries IL the
proper works made.
The land of the Canadian Pacific scheme
lies in solid block on both sides of the
railroad between Calgary and Medicine
Hat. 1t is fiat or slightly rolling prairie,
and is now used for grazing. The strip
is 100 miles long, running back for some
miles on each side of the track. The water
Is 20 come from the Bow river, a beautf-
full mountain stream. 1t will be fed by
other rivers. which flow northward from
the United States through the Belly and
Bow into the Saskatchewan and thence
on To Hudson's bay.
A Big Irrigation Ditch.
The Bow river flows by Calgary. / drove
out today to look ut the bitches already
excavated, and TO examine the irrigation
project far 1t is completed. Taking
carriages. We drove for miles over the prai-
RE, riding at times along the embankments
of Inc main canal. which is sixty feet wide
at the bottom, ten feet deep and takes
from the Bow something like 10000 gal
Ions of water every second. At many
places the men were working, and the
scenes were much like those ] saw on the
Panama canal. There were hundreds of
horses scooping up the prairie. there were
great steam shoyels gouging out the earth
and loading It upon cars, and there were
long train loads of excayated material NOV
ing on the temporary tracks from one
place to another. The soil is harder to
work than that of the Culebra cut. Guile
bra Is made of a shaly rock. and a sin
gle blast may loosen many tons. Here the
earth is a conglomerate of sticky clay and
great boulders which have consistency
something like soft taffy or half worked
putty. Ii gives little resistance and some
parts have to be blasted over and over
again. The stuff is OF such a nature that
the steam shoyels cannot work in 1t with