Imperial Valley press., 1914-07-14
LOWER CALIFORNIA Is
NOT INVITING REGION


mia, Mexico's isolated peninsula, the
coast of which the Pacific fleet of the
I United States is now patrolling, is
one of the least known territories in
4 North America. The following facts
concerning this arm of land, which
projects about 500 miles southeastern
| ly from the southern border of Cali
fornia, were given out by the Ma
tional Geographic Society here to-
DAY:
The width of the peninsula varies
from about thirty to more than 100
miles, and its irregular coast line,
more than 1000 miles long, is bor-
dered by numerous islands. Being
mainly a mountainous, desert region,
! it is thinly peopled and presents many
sharply contrasting conditions. Low,
sun-scorched plains, where death by
thirst awaits the traveller, lie close
to the bases of towering granite
peaks, belted by forests and capped
in winter by snow; desolate plateaus
of black lava look down on valleys
scanned with green -bordered streams.
At the time of its discovery, in
1888, by an expedition sent out by
Cortez in search of fabulously rich
island, it is estimated to have been
inhabited by $4,000 Indians, who Wig
orously resented the intrusion and
prevented the newcomers from get
ting foothold for more than CEN
tury. The Jesuits then came in and
were wonderfully successful in explor-
ing TIE peninsula and establishing
missions. They established three
main trails, one along each coast and
! the third down the middle, which
serve as the regular routes of travel
today. The Indians have vanished
| from all parts of their former terri
tory, except few in the extreme
northern end.
During the last half-century all
parts of the territory have been Wis
ited mainly by Americans, in search
of mines and other natural resources,
but little of the knowledge gained
has become available to the public.
Gold, silver, copper, iron and other
minerals and much fertile land have
teen found. but the scarity of water,
fuel, forage and the difficulties of
TRANSFORMATION have united with other
causes to bring about failure to de-
velop the resources.
The climate of Lower California .lp
general is hot and arid. Nort'fern
conditions are closely like those IN
adjoining parts of Southern Cantor
,a;-; ;,,-+ha~ ~roiadle they are rlorre Ar, ard
Lut the extreme southern en-
though arid, has more regular sum-
mer rains. The peninsula suffers long
periods of drought, during which no
rainfall sufficient to start vegetation
occur; over large areas for periods
of from three to five years. These
dry periods may be succeeded by tor
rental rains, which sweep the coun-
try and roll great floods down to the
sea. Surface water is scarce and linz
tied mainly to isolated water holes
in the rocks or to springs from which
small streams flow skert distance.
The Lilo Sarto Domingo is the orc
living stream within the peninsula
which flows on the surface from its
source to the sea throughout the
year.
These conditions have resulted in
the development of the richest and
most extraordinary desert flora in the
world. The bird and mammal life,
however, is closely related to that of
Southern California. The plains
abound with small desert mammals,
such as rabbits, pocket mice, kanga-
roo rats and others. A large num-
Der of the smaller desert mammals
never drink water, it having been
found impossible to teach some of
them to take water. Antelope, noun
tain sheep, mule deer and mountain
lions are the only large game AMI
mails.
The peninsula is thinly peopled
and enormous areas remain uninhab-
tied. The most populous section is
the .egion south of La Paz, where
rains are more regular than further
rorth A few small towns and wide
ly-scattered communities along the
coast, with limited number of vii
lages, ranches and miners camps il
the interior, cover the population.
Lower California has territorial
form of government, and, owing to
its great length, is divided near the
middle into a northern and a south