The Rathdrum tribune. (Rathdrum, Idaho) 1903-1963, 1916-04-28
IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Geo. F. Hatch Describes Farming
In Mojave Valley.
Hlnkley. Calf. Aprll 4.le,

| Al 0AuJoHG dACys
Hinkley. Calf, April 4, 1916
Editor RATHDRUM TRIBUNE:
My third month on the Mojava
desert is now drawing to a close and
as 1T has been suggested that my
friends at home might be interested
in a description OF the country i
thought I'd try my hand at a letter,
But how shall / describe II? There
is nothing up there to compare with
1t. Your dead brown fields after
harvest look thrifty compared with
the utter desolation Of some of these
sand drifted desert stretches. And
your greenest fields in your most
beautiful seasons are poor spectacle
compared with an alfalfa field on
some of these improved places down
here.
When l came it was raining. They
say that about five inches fell 10 the
hills. But the hills,or most of them,
are made of solid rock. There IS no
soil on them and they shed water like
a steel roof As result, much
damage was done in the valley. and
in the lovely country below the
mountains the floods ravaged orange
groves and city streets alike. l had
heard that rain was expensive 10
Southern California. Now / know it
is.
And they have wind too. The
natives say it has to come to blow the
rain away. But they wish 1t wouldn't
( Just the same, for 1t drys out the
sand very quickly and then it picks it
up and piles 1t in big drifts In all
/ sorts of inconvenient places. II it
happens to be your garden or alfalfa
field it is all the same-iust grin and
bear 1t. Get your team and Fresno
scraper out and 90 to work. The
sun will shine again tomorrow and
you will forget the wnd-perhaps.
] saw one narrow strip Of fine
alfalfa buried eighteen inches deep
with sand after big storm. Anoth-
er had little drift behiDd each stool
Of alfalfa that made the first irrlga-
tion almost impossible as the farmer
lacked tools TO level 1t with. Down
on the river a farmer lost twenty
acres of young seeding by having IL
blown out of the ground and another
man who was rich before the storm is
now working for wages because the
flood took his entire farm away-80
acres of well established alfalfa, yield.
ing big every year.
In these winds everything is bound
to suffer of course. The tree leaves
are burned bY the sand till the large
trees look blighted and unsightly and
the small ones lose their leaves entlre-
ly. Ones face will suffer too II be Is
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l tried 1t once. But ones face will
heal and the trees will grow new
leaves. / am kept continually guess
Ing as to whether it is best to leave 1t
all or to move the family down In
spite of the wind and make my home
here, 10 the sunniest, healthiest spot
in these United States.
Yes, it's desolate. The land lays
10 big fiat valleys between the noun
tains. This one must be thirty miles
each way-but there are smaller bills
scattered here and there over it. Ii
the distance the mountains are high
and snow capped and make a beauti-
full picture at sunrise and sunset
but closer they are black and barren,
except for mineral, rich deposits of
which are now being uncovered in
some of them.
The soil is plain, white sandal
least that is what green horn like
me would call 1t. There is little
gravel under the drift soil but very
little of 1t is stony. 1t needs no lime
as you may have guessed but IL Is not
troubled with alkali To any great
extent. There are places OF course
where alkali is plentiful but there is
plenty OF room elsewhere II man
wishes to farm. Underneath the
surface, about ten or fifteen feet
down, there is cement like substance
that carries saline matter enough to
whiten the ground IL spread upon it,
In some districts this lays closer to
the surface, even coming up here and
there where it renders the afflicted
fields almost impossible of cnltiva-
ton by Its hardness.
or vegetation there is plentiful
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