The Eureka sentinel. [volume] (Eureka, Nev.) 1902-current, 1914-04-18
SOVEREIGN STATE OF NEVADA
Facts About Our State Which
May Instruct Nevadans On
Refresh Memories

Although Nevada is the fourth
largest State in the Union, and has
been a State for half a century,
there is perhaps no State so little
known and none of vast resources
and possibilities so little developed.
Ever since it has been State mining
has been its paramount industry
with stock raising second and farm
ing third in the industrial list. But
this order bids fair to be reversed in
the not far distant future. as Nevada
is just entering upon a period of
great agricultural development.
Nevada is a part of the great
American basin, that vast tableland
lying west of the Rockies, and has
an average elevation of from 1000
to 5000 feet. About one-sixth of
the area of the State is alkali wastes
and barrens, which in the present
stage of agricultural science are
hopeless of reclamation and are of
value only for their mineral con-
tents of salt, soda and borax The
mountains and hilly areas, unsuited
for cultivation, but excellent for
stock raising, and on which a half
million head of cattle and a million
and half of sheep now find SUBJ
sistence cover more than one-half of
the State. The total arabic land is
estimated to be not less than one
fourth the State. This represents
100000 acres of land, an area, by
the way, equivalent to all of the
States of Massachusetts, New Hamp-
shire and Rhode Island combined.
This land except for sagebrush, has
lain fallow for ges and furnishes
the richest soil for farming, yet less
than five per cent of it is to-day un-
der cultivation.
Nevada is land of little rain. the
average annual rainfall varying from
four inches in the southern valleys
to from eight inches to fourteen
inches in the valleys of northern,
eastern and western Nevada. The
great problem with the agriculturist
is, therefore, the water problem.
There are some 200 valleys big and
little in the State. separated from
one another by mountain ranges
anywhere from 1000 to 1000 feet
higher than the valley levels. These
mountain ranges gather the storms
and intercept the precipitation and
have a rainfall three times as great
as the valleys. The numerous rivers
and streams which rise in these
mountains furnish water for irriga-
ton.
The waters of only five rivers in
Nevada find their way into the ocean,
the others emptying into lakes with
out outlets or disappearing below the
surface of the valleys, to reappear
in many instances through artesian
wells or through pumps driven by
electric motors. To these sources
of water supply must be added
springs which occur in many parts
of the State from which considerable
bodies of land are irrigated.
While the natural flow of nearly
all the streams during the irrigation
season Is already appropriated, only
a small portion of the flood waters
are utilized. We're these waters
properly impounded and conserved
to flow only during the irrigation
season they would be sufficient to
reclaim and put under cultivation
several million acres of the choicest
land for farming and fruit raising.
Already Government funds and
private capital have been devoted in
large sums in solving the water prob
lem in Nevada. Several water de-
velopment enterprises are now in
progress and others of greater or
lesser magnitude are being projected.
Here is a field where much capital
can be invested with the greatest
ultimate profit. Where now is desert,
one requirement only Is lacking to
transform the desert into waving
fields of alfalfa and grain, the verdure
of plants and fruit, tree and shrub
berry. the homes of farmers, and
seats of villages, towns and cities.
That one requirement is water, and
that in turn calls for capital.
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