KERN COUNTY, COST OF DITCHING AND PLANTING. 311 was checked, irrigated, reclaimed from its former arid state, and made productive and profitable. The same figures demonstrate, however, that on the land ditched, checked, and cultivated, out of a total expenditure in accomplishing these results of $184,963.55 the cost of the reclamation works amounted to $121,380.75, or, in other words, and in round numbers, for every dollar spent in putting in the crop it was necessary to spend $2 to construct the irrigating works. This proportion is figured on the totals, including the varying crops of alfalfa seeded with wheat, alfalfa seeded alone, and Egyptian corn seeded alone, and, as the cost of the alfalfa seed is high, and to show the proportion between cost of ditching and checking and the cost of planting of each different crop, the following figures are brought into comparison: This thorough and complete though expensive class of irrigation works has been found quite necessary, for on the thirsty plains of the lower San Joaquin Valley water must be thoroughly distributed, even like nature's irrigation distributes the falling rain drops. It is also necessary to be able to rapidly flood and as rapidly drain the various checks, or otherwise the crop will be parboiled and killed from the unity of the water and the torrid sun. Hence embankments (or checks) for retaining the water, ditches to distribute and carry it away, and many flood-gates, drops, weirs, and other similar structures to control its flow are of necessity required. The lands of which the above figures show the cost of ditching and checking are situated about 25 miles from Kern River, the fountain head of Kern County irrigation, and the figures do not embrace the cost of the main canal, which carries its flood of water for distribution amongst them in excess of a hundred smaller distributing ditches. The cost of carrying the water over many miles, if applied to any limited area of land, would be so excessively heavy as to preclude any possibility of profit; hence the reclamation of these arid tracts, distant from a water supply, can be effected only by some such means as are employed in Kern County, Cal., where the many miles of ditches are all under one intelligent management, to which the various lands supplied with water pay their tribute in most moderate water charges. The expenditures thus made in the construction of the main canals, together with the other reclamation works, as heretofore explained, constitute the farmer's capital, on which, though heavy at first, irrigation multiplies adequate profits, with which come increased population, civilization, and homes, with all other changes consequent upon the transformation scene from desert to garden, from arid thirst to bending grain fields, sweet-scented hay, and heavy-laden orchards. On the other hand, when the enduring, substantial nature of these works is considered, and when it is considered what a small percentage of additional cost is applicable to any one crop produced through such means, and on the other hand with an assurance of adequate water at the particular period when necessary to the proper nurture of the crops, and with absolute reliance against an oversupply, with a most productive soil compelled by irrigation to obey man's every wish, the original cost of the irrigation works as compared with the profits to be derived therefrom can be compared with the first crop which a husbandman would lose elsewhere through an insufficiency of rain, except that the one assures profit and the other loss. MEMORANDUM CONCERNING PLAT SHOWING LOCATION OF HAY-STACKS AT POSO, 1889. [Inclosure No. 11]. The plat represents a portion of what is known as the Poso district, in Kern County, and shows the locations of the various hay-stacks, the result of the cutting of hay made in the summer of 1889 on lands which, during the previous winter and spring, were, by J. B. Haggin and his associates, ditched, checked, and planted in wheat and alfalfa, and transformed, through irrigation, from an arid, unproductive, unprofitable condition to a verdant field of alfalfa. The total acreage seeded to wheat and alfalfa, as shown by this map, amounts fo.. ... acres From which grain hay was cut and stacked, in the locations as shown on the map, to amount of...... 5,556 .tons 14,919 tons 268, 100 Therefore giving an average to the acre of hay to amount of. .... acres 6,083 Giving a percentage of crop lost of only 7 per cent., the season being one of the worst known for ten years. This plat was made for use in the office of the Kern County property, to show the numbers of the stacks, as a reference to their tonnage as spread upon the bay reco ds, and also as an index for office use, indicating the foremen who put up the various stacks. At the same time, as connected with the productiveness of irrigated lands, it is interesting from the fact of indicating, from the proximity of the stack locations one to the other representing a total of nearly 15,000 tons of hay, the wonderful quantity of hay obtainable under proper irrigation.. The reclamation and irrigation of the arid lands of Kern County, which lands up to the present time have been principally devoted to the raising of stock on alfalfa, has been most immediately made profitable through the hay prodnction, demonstrating the productiveness of the soil and proving the correctness of the irrigation methods. For a more thorough explanation in this same connection see inclosure No. 12, headed "Memorandum of hay cut, season of 1889, on Kern County property," etc. MEMORANDUM OF HAY CUT SEASON OF 1889 ON KERN COUNTY PROPERTY AND REMARKS ON IRRIGATION. As regards the lands in the Poso district, the records show that for the season of 1888-'89, and subsequent to the completion of the hay cutting, the pasturing of the same lands by cattle was commenced between the 6th and 16th of July, 1889, on which same lands the ditching and checking were done in September, October, November, and December, 1888; the clearing and plowing were done in November and December, 1888, and the harrowing, cultivating, and seeding were done mostly in December, 1888. Poso District. The total acreage seeded to wheat and alfalfa, as shown by statement inclosed, amounts to 5,556 acres; from which, as shown above, cut gain hay to amount of 14,919 tons, therefore giving an average to the acre of hay to a mount of 2.68 tons. Out of 6,572 acres, total seeded, a good stand of alfalfa was obtained on 6,083 acres, giving a percentage of crop lost of only 7 per cent., the season being one of the worst known for ten years. BALANCE-SHEET ON CROPS OF WHEAT AND ALFALFA. 313 A statement (R. P. O. 1247) showing all debits and credits against the land seeded to wheat and alfalfa, demonstrates the following: Value of pasturage, say six months, at 25 cents per acre.. $16.08 Total credit.... 17.58 ..... Add one year's interest on net amount invested at 10 per cent.... Debit balance representing net cost of ditches and checks and of stand of alfalfa 3.73 .37 Total cost at end of first year of 1 acre alfalfa land........ 4. 10 On the same land the second year's operations could easily be made to show the following: Debits: Net cost ditches and checks and alfalfa on 1 acre alfalfa land $4.10 Cost of cutting 4 tons alfalfa hay, at $1.50.. Three irrigations (two or even one would probably be sufficient) at 3 cents.. The profits of the second year, $13.40, representing at 10 per cent. interest on ....per acre.. Leaving balance of amount invested on which interest can be earned as above to represent value of dwelling, barns, outhouses, fences, wells, cattle, sheep, horses, poultry, etc. (the live stock earning interest on their own valuation) 134.00 100.00 34.00 On a farm of 160 acres this additional investment of $34 per acre would amount to $5,440, a sum more than sufficient for such requirements. Thus it is seen that under such a system of irrigation it is more than possible to receive, within the first and second years, return of the original investment and interest on a valuable estate. The cutting of a total of more than 27,000 tons of hay in a district of country which fifteen years ago would not produce 27 tons, the miles upon miles of verdant green, housands upon thousands of cattle, horses, sheep, hogs, fat and contented as they crop the waving grass, the avenues of tall and stately trees bending their refreshing shade as against the noonday sun, the orchards of deciduous and citrus fruits, vineyards of bright-hued grapes, the immense stacks of hay, warehouses full of grain telling of reserve forces for man and beast, the whirring mills grinding that grain for home use and shipment, the dairies with their heavy laden trucks of sweetest butter, their shelves upon shelves of new-made cheese, the thriving towns busy with an empire's trade, the homes of happy faces, happy children telling the story of thrift and plenty, contentment and prosperity, the every possibility, every inducement for a thousand such homes where there is now one, for a kingdom where there is now a county, all and each of these proceed from one common cause, but one lever moved then all juto being and that was water-water proceeding from Whitney's snow-clad peaks, |