RECLAIMING THE ARID SOUTHWEST.

IRRIGATION, with the complementary question of water-storage, is one of the most interesting and vital problems now confronting the citizens of Arizona and New Mexico. The results already achieved in the reclamation of their semi-arid lands are inviting national attention; while the promising future outlook is making possible for these Territories a large increase of immigration, not only on the part of foreigners, but also of home and money seekers from the more thickly settled North and East. A study of this water problem must be prefaced by a review of the more important physical characteristics of that country, so long known as the Great American Desert and as a region given over to Indian troubles, cattle-thieving, and wrangles between herdsmen.

New Mexico and Arizona comprise, respectively, an area of 122,000 and 114,000 square miles. The face of the country is a vast tableland - part of the Colorado plateau of very considerable elevation, relieved by rugged and detached Rocky Mountain chains in the northerly and easterly portions, with a tendency to slope gradually into sandy and gravelly plains toward the extreme southerly and southwesterly regions. The climate is diverse, ranging from the semi-tropical heat of the southern portions to the invigorating cold of the northerly mountains. During the entire year the sun shines brightly through cloudless skies. The rainfall is slight, rarely exceeding ten inches.

The soil is generally a rich, warm, loose, and loamy earth, which is only waiting for water to make it rival in fertility the Nile Valley and become capable of supporting a dense population. In its virgin state, however, it looks to the Eastern farmer about as promising as a sea beach. In the desert regions there is much alkali land. Grama, mesquite, salt, and buffalo grasses flourish luxuriantly, and afford a rarely failing pasturage for the great herds. In the autumn the uncut grass turns to hay, saving the expense of cutting, baling, and storing.

The census of 1900 records 122,931 people in Arizona and 195,310 in New Mexico, the majority in both instances being of native parents, descendants of Americans and Mexicans, and constituting a permanent

resident population. The population includes, however, 12,000 Indians in Arizona and 25,000 in New Mexico, with a few scattered Chinese, Japanese, and negroes. Mining, horticulture, agriculture, and stock raising are the leading pursuits.

Because of the scarcity of the rain and the uncertainty of its fall, together with the remarkable fertility of the soil whenever water is applied, there has been from remote times a desire to gather water from the rivers and other streams, to draw it from its main courses into canals and reservoirs, to use it bountifully in the spring and summer, and to accumulate it plentifully during the few weeks of winter or the rainy season. The cliff dwellers and the ancient Toltecs and Aztecs, like the Assyrians and the Egyptians, practised the arts of irrigation, and well understood the problem of conveying water to the uplands. Even now, in many of the valleys, there can be readily traced the lines of great canals from which the early husbandman watered his corn and beans. When these peoples disappeared irrigation went too, and it has been almost a lost calling until within the last fifteen years.

There are, at this time, some 450,000 acres of irrigable land in the beautiful Salt River Valley of Southern Arizona; and what was once an arid waste is now the loveliest of garden spots a great territory fifteen miles wide, lying between the Verde and the Gila Rivers, and extending fifty miles along Salt River, the main artery whose numerous canals are the blood-vessels that bring life to the soil. The total flow of the canals approximates 1,000,000 gallons per minute. The main laterals have a length of nearly 400 miles, and the integral mileage is very extensive. Foremost are the Arizona and the Grand Canals. The former is fortyseven miles long, beginning near the junction of the Verde and the Salt Rivers, twenty-eight miles east of Phoenix, skirting the foothills to the north, and rendering fit for horticultural and agricultural purposes a large area of semi-tropical desert. Other great canals, including the Consolidated, irrigate the southern portion of the valley, while carrying the life-giving waters far out over the plains and lavishly distributing their riches. Notable, indeed, is the contrast between the luxuriant irrigated areas and the sage-brush desert above.

In Northeastern Arizona, each of the counties of Navajo and Apache contains over 10,000 acres of reclaimed land. Fully 100,000 more acres of land in Navajo could be reclaimed immediately by means of water storage. Nearly 4,000,000 acres in Mohave County are only waiting to receive the waters of the mighty Colorado as soon as it can be diverted from the deep and tortuous channels through which it runs.

Irrigation can be conducted successfully in many parts of New Mexico. There are already in operation, in the north, the Springer system, with fifty miles of ditches and five reservoirs for 22,000 acres, and the Vermajo, with fifty-seven miles of ditches and ten reservoirs for 30,000 acres. In the northwest there are 200 miles of ditches supplying 24,000 acres, and in the southwest, in Grant County, there is an extensive ditch system. In the central portions over fifty companies have been organized and are only awaiting the necessary capital. In addition, there is the Rio Grande Valley, where, particularly in the vicinity of Santa Fé, from the earliest days there has been irrigation in a small way. This valley, 300 miles long by thirty miles wide, if placed under irrigation, would, it is estimated, support 1,500,000 people.

Undoubtedly the greatest system in the arid Southwest is in the Pecos Valley of Southeastern New Mexico, where over $4,000,000 has been expended by private enterprise during the last twelve years in turning aside the waters of the Pecos River and making a wonderfully exuberant garden of the valley famed in song and story as the former retreat of the most desperate train-robbers, cattle-thieves, and other outlaws that the West has ever known. In this valley, which is one hundred and twenty miles long, two enormous reservoirs, McMillan Lake and Lake Avalon, have been made by the erection of dams carried across the river just north of Carlsbad. One of these is 1,140 feet over the top, and completely fills a notch worn by the river through a bed of solid limestone. McMillan Lake is thirteen miles long, and contains enough water to supply the entire lower valley; while Lake Avalon is half as large. There are now available for cultivation over 250,000 acres, of which perhaps one-fifth is engaged. Here irrigation has not only restored a sun-baked alkali plain, but it has created several prosperous little settlements, and has transformed the towns of Carlsbad and Roswell from uninteresting and shadeless gambling-holes into attractive and lively small cities, each with a wealth of fine trees, hedges, and other physical attributes of the well-ordered New England community.

More than 1,000 miles of canals, main and sub-lateral, carry the waters of the Pecos to a myriad of little farms, where they are sent through tiny ditches, banked with earth, until every living organism has received its share. At the unusually low yearly rate of $1.25 per acre, the farmer has the right, at twenty-four hours' notice, to all he needs. The water is hard and of an excellent quality; but its chief virtue is the possession of a great quantity of carbonates and phosphates. Moreover, the valley is a veritable bed of gushing springs; one of them

being sufficient to irrigate 20,000 acres, and another having a flow of 1,000 gallons per minute. Here are grown the finest cantaloupes in existence, as well as peaches, apples, pears, grapes, and plums of the highest standard of excellence. The vegetables arrive early, and include beets, asparagus, sweet and Irish potatoes, cauliflower, onions, cabbages, and celery. The local markets take a large share of these crops, and the remainder finds a quick sale as far north as Minnesota. Much of the land is devoted to alfalfa, Kaffir corn, sorghum, millet, and other forage crops, these being the most profitable because of the large tributary ranches.

Some very large farms are owned by prominent stockmen - men who are not only alive to the value of breeding home-grown Durham and Hereford bulls, Rambouillet and Merino rams, and Berkshire and Poland China boars, instead of importing them from Europe, or from Missouri, Kansas, and Illinois, but who realize the growing demand for homegrown stock throughout the Southwest and in Mexico. Ranchmen are profiting by fattening the range cattle on alfalfa, while the sheep raisers top the Kansas City markets with lambs matured on milo maize.

Probably the finest stock farm in New Mexico is that owned by Major Littlefield. It is situated near Roswell, and contains 1,256 acres, a very small fraction of his total land-holdings. The farm is divided into fields of from twenty to eighty acres each. Sixty-five acres are devoted to apples, of which the crop last year was enormous and of the finest quality. Each field is surrounded by an irrigating ditch six feet in width. Besides choice fruit and vegetables, enough alfalfa is grown to fatten the blooded stock, as well as to tide over any emergency in case the grass should give out on one of the big Littlefield ranches. Additional water is supplied from an artesian well, 580 feet deep and of a six-inch bore, which throws a solid stream thirty-five feet high. The water is fresh and is particularly available during the winter when the ditches occasionally freeze. Bordering one side of the farm is a roadway embowered by graceful cottonwoods and prettily termed "Lover's Lane." Here for three miles the shade is so dense that the skylight at the far end resembles the headlight of a locomotive in the distance.

Irrigation means intensive farming- the maximum yield on the minimum area. While the initial outlay is high, the results more than justify the extra expenditure.. In the Pecos Valley land that was originally worth fifty cents an acre now brings twenty dollars an acre; while, to cite another illustration, in the horticultural districts of Southern

Arizona, improved land frequently sells for one hundred dollars an acre and even more. Irrigation means permanency of residence among a class of small landholders, which in turn suggests an increase of population.

Foremost of the crops made possible by irrigation is alfalfa, sometimes called lucerne or Spanish clover, a hardy and aggressive plant which has revolutionized the stock industry, besides affording a prosperous occupation to the small farmer. Alfalfa not only grows rapidly and with little care, but it acts as a fertilizer. In the Salt River Valley alone nearly 100,000 acres are devoted to its culture. To the progressive stockman it is a blessing, for it relieves him of the expense, trouble, and risk from climatic changes incident to sending his yearlings and two-year-old steers to the Middle States to be fattened and matured before shipment to market. Three months in the alfalfa fields will work as many favorable changes in the thin range cattle as one year on Northern fields.

When it is remembered that on the open range twenty acres per year are allowed each head of cattle, and that one acre of alfalfa will support two head, the value of this product will be readily perceived. Again, if we take the appraised value of government land, one dollar the acre, and add to this two and one-half dollars as the minimum cost of making it irrigable, we find that by spending upon it two and one-half times its commercial worth as unreclaimed land its value will, through irrigation, appreciate forty-fold.

Alfalfa, too, is responsible for the continued prosperity in the hog business, though it is to the climate that the entire absence of cholera is due. Both in cheapness and efficacy as a flesh-builder alfalfa is better than corn. A steady and profitable market for Arizona hogs has been opened in Southern California, while from places much farther away is coming an appreciable demand for "alfalfa pork."

Until recently, the breeding of horses has not been considered in the light of an industry in the Southwest, for the reason that the hardy little cow-pony, as prolific as any prairie weed, supplied all demands. Now there is a call from the towns and mining districts for a larger and stockier animal, and breeders are achieving favorable results in the alfalfa pastures.

Two other profitable though widely divergent activities following the promotion of alfalfa culture are bee-keeping and ostrich-farming; the former now yielding annually over one million pounds in Arizona alone. Chicago is the principal market, and the output is largely used by confectioners and bakers. Ostrich raising is of comparatively recent