Projects and extensions of projects investigated by the Reclamation Service in the Western States-Continued.

1 These estimates must be considered as merely preliminary and subject to change.

2 No estimate.

Irrigable and irrigated acreage.-The statistics of irrigation show that on the projects of the Reclamation Service there are about 500,000 acres of land to which the service is ready to deliver water but which are not irrigated. This immediately raises the query as to why this is so and suggests that further development be delayed. As a matter of fact, such a conclusion would be entirely unwarranted.

The most important item in the acreage not irrigated consists of the unirrigated portions of farms that are occupied and cultivated but have not been wholly brought under cultivation. The reduction of the average farm in the arid region to actual cultivation by the occupier requires clearing, leveling, and ditching, and is a slow process with the average settler, who has limited capital and is probably depending upon his own efforts and his own teams to accomplish results. The facts are that on the average three-fourths of each occupied farm is actually under irrigation, and this is a very good showing under the circumstances. Many old-settled communities have done little better.

The next item of importance is the acreage represented by holdings of nonresidents or of persons owning more than 160 acres and who are unable to purchase water right for the excess holding. The law prohibits the sale of water rights to nonresidents and to holdings greater than 160 acres. Gradually the excess holdings are being disposed of to new settlers, and the nonresidents are either selling to settlers or are themselves gradually occupying the lands and placing them under cultivation.

A third class is composed of the public lands that are open to entry and have not been filed upon. These are comparatively few, are distributed on several of the public-land projects, and are as a rule lands but recently opened to settlement or are of inferior quality, so that while they may be eventually taken this is not done until after the better opportunities are exhausted. Roughly speaking, the area'

covered by crop census to which we can deliver water may be divided about as follows:

Advantages of irrigation, farming.-Agriculture in the arid region where irrigation is feasible has several important advantagės over that in the humid region. The soils of the arid region by the nature of the case have generally not been leached of their mineral plant foods as have those in the humid region, and they are therefore much richer in this respect on the average and are seldom or never acid, as are soils in the humid region. This quality has the disadvantage at times of leaving the arid lands charged with hurtful alkalis, which seldom remain in the humid region on account of their solubility, but where the injurious salts do not predominate the general principle of abundance of mineral plant food obtains and constitutes a distinct advantage for the soils of the arid region over those of humid regions.

There is much advantage in being able to apply water to growing crops at just the time and in just the quantity needed, and to withhold it at will. Where the water supply is ample this constitutes a very important advantage in arid regions.

Another striking advantage is the preponderance of clear days in an arid region, where the absence of rainy and cloudy weather affords a much larger percentage of sunshine than is found in humid. regions. As sunlight is one of the most important essentials of healthy plant growth, this advantage is quite important.

Results from these advantages.-It appears that the average gross product of agricultural crops on reclamation projects is just about double the average yield from nonirrigated lands in the country at large. The larger product obtainable per acre from irrigated lands jutifies and permits a more careful and intensive cultivation, which with a favorable climate and controllable water supply, yields more certain results than the same care in the humid region.

This means that as much product can be obtained from a 40-acre tract under irrigation as from the average 80-acre tract in the humid region. This, of course, requires more labor per acre, but much less labor in proportion to product. It permits and encourages intensive cultivation and smaller holdings and consequent greater centralization of population. The result is that the isolation of country life. is to a large extent eliminated as the irrigating farmer will have fully

twice as many neighbors within a given radius as his prototype in the humid region. The social advantages thus obtained react upon the character of the people and of the communities and other conditions characteristic of irrigated regions to a similar effect.

Cooperation with his neighbors is forced upon the irrigator because it is usually impracticable for him to irrigate his land without such cooperation, the feasible irrigation projects usually being in tracts of many thousands of acres, accommodating thousands of families and giving rise to towns, villages, and characteristic civilizations of their own. This condition stimulates the civic conscience and attention to public affairs of common interest so that the local governments that grow up under such conditions are usually of a superior order and controlled by a superior intelligence on the part of the population living thereunder.

Irrigation progress.-During the past year the operations of the Government under the various reclamation laws have continued to develop the resources of the projects undertaken as shown by the gradual increase in the area for which the service can supply water, the increase in areas actually irrigated and cropped, and the increase in the value of crop produced. This progressive increase is shown in the following table, which gives statistics only for those areas covered by crop census, excluding practically all those additional areas which are served from the works of the Reclamation Service under Warren Act contracts and from which crop statistics were not obtainable. It is estimated that, including these areas, the crop value in 1918 amounted to $100,000,000 or over.

The statistics given in the above table do not, however, tell the whole story. The easy terms of repayment granted by the Government and the high prices received for their products have combined with the other favorable conditions and with the industry of the people to produce a condition of prosperity beyond the indications of the bare statistics.

No new projects undertaken.-No new projects have been undertaken within the past year, as there have been no funds available for this purpose. The gradual decline in the receipts from the sales of public lands, due largely to the wholesale disposal of these lands under the operation of the 640-acre homestead act, has naturally greatly restricted the operations under the reclamation act. The small payments provided by law from the irrigated lands have kept the returns from the constructed projects to a low point. It is now necessary, under the provisions of existing law, to set aside $1,000,000 per annum from these receipts to repay the advances to the reclamation fund which were provided by the act of 1910, known as the "bond loan." It has been possible on this account only slightly to extend the irrigated area by some extension of canal systems and to take care of water-logged conditions on some of the projects.

Seepage and drainage.-The industry of irrigation by which water is applied to the surface of the soil for the growing of crops is necessarily attended by a considerable escape of such water to the subsoil, where in most cases it joins ground water, and this gradually rises. Such a condition is of course aggravated and expedited by wasteful applications of water, and this is very difficult to avoid if the soils are open and porous, but even in case of