Chapter 4

WHYMONTANA IS ANARIDCOUNTRY.

It has been stated by Major J. W. Powell, that in a general way the line between the humid and arid regions, or the amount of precipitation below which irrigation becomes necessary for the cultivation of crops, is from 24 to 28 inches per annum. This of course depends largely on the distribution of the rainfall, the proportion falling during the growing season, the humidity of the atmosphere, the character of the soil, etc.

The average annual precipitation in Montana is 14.92 inches, while the total average precipitation during the growing season is but 5.23 inches; from these considerations alone it is evident that the State lies wholly in the arid region.

This statement is further born out by the fact that no native farmer will settle a ranch or undertake to raise any kind of crops without facilities for irrigating, since experience has taught them all, that, though there may occasionally be an exceptionally wet season in which they can raise good crops without artificial aid, still, the years when crops depending wholly upon rain-fall for their moisture would be entirely lost, are so frequent as to render farming without irrigation very hazardous and unprofitable.

SOIL.

The soil along the stream bottoms at a slight elevation above their beds is usually a heavy, black, clayey loam, and though rich and fertile is soon clogged by water, and then in drying, cakes on the surface, killing the young plants. On this account the irrigators seldom water these bottom lands until after the crop has acquired a healthy growth, preferring to trust to the early rains to force the young sprouts above the surface, rather than run the risk of its crusting and thus preventing them from breaking through.

These bottom lands though really the poorest for irrigating, are nearly the only lands now cultivated, because of the greater ease and cheapness of supplying them with water. From two to three tons of hay and from 35 to 50 bushels of grain per acre are raised even on these inferior soils.

The best, and by far the more abundant agricultural lands, are the "bench lands," these are situated high above the stream beds and the soil is usually a warm open, rich, sandy-loam, several feet in depth and usually underlain by a deep bed of gravel. Though in irrigating, this soil at first requires more water, it will, owing to its excellent natural drainage, last for all time and will neither clog with water nor cake on the surface.

It is these bench lands which will be rendered irrigable by government aid and surveys, though to develop them will require large amounts of capital; still, they are so extensive in area that the work can generally be conducted on a grand and economical scale.

DUTY OFWATER.

From the meagre information now obtainable it is probable that in average soils and for the staple hay, grain and vegetable crops in Montana, about one cubic foot of water per second, flowing during the irrigating season, will be sufficient for 100 acres; this quantity is known as the "duty of water."

The irrigating season lasts about three months. While the crops are maturing during part of May, June and July, they will receive two or three waterings, and in early September the hay lands are again watered in order to start the growth of grass before the frosts.

In case all the surplus water of a given stream is stored, the duty of that stream will be increased by the amount of water now flowing to waste during the remaining nine months, and as a portion of this time is the flood period, owing to the melting of the snows in the mountains and to the spring rains, this storage water will increase the duty of the stream at least five-fold; that is, five times as many acres may be irrigated by the stream as at present, provided that storage capacity can be found for all of its waste waters.

In considering the duty of a stream it must be remembered that there is a great loss of water by seepage through the sides of a canal and evaporation from its surface, between the headworks and the irrigated lands, this loss may amount to from 25 to 35 per cent., according to climate, soil, and the length and cross-section of the canal.

PRESENTSTATE OFIRRIGATION—PROGRESS ANDLAWS.

The earlier stages of irrigation development are better illustrated in Montana than in any other State in the Union.

There irrigation practice and laws are exceedingly crude and remain so chiefly because of the abundance of water, and the ease and facility with which it can be diverted to the land; as a consequence of this latter fact the laws were framed in the most liberal spirit, declaring right of eminent domain, acknowledging the right of priority in appropriating the waters, and further stating, that any person having a ditch leading to irrigable lands may use the waters of the territory for irrigation.

The latest law, framed in 1885, is a very slight improvement; it requires persons appropriating water, to post the usual notice in a conspicuous place; to file with the county recorder a notice of appropriation, with names and proper description of place, stream, etc., and that work must be commenced within forty days of the posting of the notice and be prosecuted with due diligence until completed.

Persons who have heretofore acquired title to the use of water, may within six months from the passage of this law file a statement of the above facts in the office of the recorder, but failure to do this shall not forfeit his rights.

Provision is made for the measurement of water, using that very uncertain and elastic unit, the miner's inch, and defining the same.

The difficulties arising under these laws will be appreciated, when I state that it is impossible to construct a rating flume that will measure the number of inches of water flowing in a large stream, by the method provided in the law.

Then, because previous appropriators are not compelled to record the amount of water appropriated, and those acquiring titles under the first law now invariably claim much more water than they need, in fact often appropriate and even record more water than there is flowing in the stream. This is owing to the fact that they were not at first compelled to construct their works, "with due diligence until completed," nor to make ditches of capacities capable of carrying the volumes claimed, and above all because there is no officer having the power to measure the quantities of water diverted or to see that the works are prosecuted with due diligence. Endless and unsatisfactory litigation results, hastened by the occupation of lands lower down on some stream which in a very dry season may not flow sufficient water for all the appropriators who have acquired titles, whereupon the later settlers who have recorded their appropriations claim the water, while those who diverted water before the passage of the last law claim the right to it, though unrecorded, and as a consequence the case is carried to the courts, often with unjust and always with expensive results.

During the past exceptionally dry season these conditions led to much bitter litigation, often to bloodshed, and equally often to financial ruin owing to the supply of water being insufficient to mature the crops planted.

Water being very abundant in the smaller mountain valleys has led to great wastefulness in its use, the irrigator after applying what water his crops needed, instead of turning it back into the stream for the use of settlers lower down, generally turns his ditch loose on the open prairie and allows the water to run to waste. Then wasteful methods of applying the water to the crops are employed, and owing to the cheap and hasty construction of a vast number of small ditches the loss by seepage is very great; it has been estimated that there is on an average a ditch for every 200 acres of land cultivated, making a total of about 2500 irrigating ditches in the State.

In the last two years there has been a marked increase in the interest taken in irrigation enterprises, and though this has resulted in the formation of several large companies, which intend to take water by long and expensive canals to sections now uncultivated, yet in these cases are universally seen the same crude methods employed in first beginnings, without the aid and advice of experienced engineers. Large canals are being constructed at great cost, capable of carrying many times the amount of water flowing in the stream appropriated, whereas a much smaller and less expensive one would have carried the entire water supply. Again small canals have been constructed to carry small volumes of water very long distances, often 50 to 80 miles, while in reality owing to the great percentage of loss by seepage and evaporation, little or none of the water entering at the headgates will ever reach the irrigable lands.

Such illy advised projects are to be even more deplored than the smaller operations before spoken of, since the certain ultimate failure of this class of enterprise will result in discouraging capitalists from investing in even well-planned irrigation projects, and will retard the construction of valuable and necessary works.

POSSIBLEIRRIGATIONENTERPRISES.

During the past season the author made an extensive though hurried reconnoisance of Montana, in the progress of which he rode on horseback 2,200 miles and traveled 3,700 miles by rail, examining with some degree of detail all of the central counties and making a few hasty trips into Choteau, Dawson and Custer Counties. In the course of this reconnoisance the sites for sixty storage reservoirs, having a combined storage capacity of about 3,250,000 acre feet were carefully examined, and lines of ten great irrigating canals approximately decided on. It may be well to state here that an acre-foot of water is a very convenient unit of measure adopted by the U. S. Geological Survey in speaking of the contents of large reservoirs, and refers to a body of water one acre in superficial area and one foot in depth.

In every case these proposed reservoirs are so situated, that their storage water will be convenient to large bodies of irrigable land, which, without some such provision for water supply must forever remain uncultivated, but which with irrigation from these reservoirs will ultimately become thickly inhabited and very productive regions. The same statements apply to the canals projected, though of course detailed surveys may prove the impracticability of some of these works as financial investments.

Mention will be made of a few of the more important of these projects; those which appear most likely to prove financial successes.

North of the Yellowstone and between it and the Musselshell and Missouri Rivers is an immense high bench land, traversed by a few long couleés, dry excepting in the times of melting snow or heavy spring storms, and then raging torrents for a period of a few days or hours. This bench land between the couleés is flat topped and has a regular and gentle slope to the eastward, falling about six feet per mile, a little more rapidly north of Big Timber, and decreasing in grade to the eastward. The general elevation of this bench above the Yellowstone River varies from 600 feet north of Stillwater, to 300 feet north of Miles City, and includes about 11,000,000 acres, of which at least 5,225,000 acres are of the best quality for agricultural purposes and readily accessible by the great canal. In all this vast area there is not even sufficient water for the few horses and cattle which range on it, and they are compelled to congregate near the occasional pools and springs scattered at long intervals over it.

From numerous examinations made hastily with aneroid and hand-level, it seems likely that a great canal can be taken from the Yellowstone, somewhere in the neighborhood of Livingston, or lower down the river, and led upon the summit of the bench with a diversion line not over 100 miles in length. Taken out at Livingston the canal would encounter no difficult construction, and would chiefly consist in earth excavation with very little rock work. It would require a few fills and flumes in crossing the larger side streams, such as the Little and Big Timber, Otter and Sweet Grass Creeks. It would reach the summit somewhere north of Merrill at an altitude of about 4,400 feet and thence could be conducted with an easy alignment eastward, with occasional falls to loose grade.

The water flowing in the Yellowstone River at Livingstone during the irrigating season this year averaged 2,300 cubic feet per second, which, with an allowance of thirty per cent. for loss by seepage and evaporation in the canal, would leave about 1,600 second feet at the point of utilization or sufficient to irrigate 160,000 acres.

The average normal discharge from Yellowstone Lake is 700 second feet, and a dam about 300 feet long and less than ten feet high, constructed below the outlet of the lake, would store the outflow from October to May, inclusive, eight months, a total including flood discharges of at least 600,000 acre feet, an amount which, allowing for loss by evaporation in the lake, and by seepage and evaporation in the canal, would irrigate 425,000 acres, in addition to the 160,000 acres previously mentioned. Besides this volume probably half as much more can be readily stored on the Lamar and Gardner Rivers, and the other branches of the Yellowstone which join it above Livingston, bringing the total area of reclaimed land to nearly 1,000,000 acres.

There are many similar and even better opportunities for irrigation development, such as the construction of a canal from the West Gallatin River near Bozeman. This canal would require no expensive diversion line, as its waters would become immediately available at the headworks, and by appropriating the 500 second feet of water flowing in the river, would reclaim at a minimum cost 50,000 acres, or twice the amount of land now cultivated there. Storage on the Upper Gallatin River would greatly increase the amount of reclaimed land.

Storage reservoirs can be easily constructed on the headwaters of the Beaver Head River, whereby at least 150,000 acres could be added to the 25,000 acres now under cultivation in the Beaver Head Valley near Dillon.

A canal requiring no diversion line can be taken out on the east side of the Missouri River near Toston, which will irrigate all of the good land in the Missouri Valley, at least 100,000 acres. This canal would require some fills and aqueducts in crossing the various side steams such as Deep and Duck Creeks, and Confederate Gulch.

Detailed surveys have been made during the past summer on the Sun River which indicate that storage will add some 250,000 acre feet to the amount of water in that stream now available for irrigation. There are at least 600,000 acres of good agricultural land between the Dearborn, Sun, and Teton Rivers, which must forever remain barren of cultivated products unless provided with water by means of storage on these streams, and the surveys above alluded to indicate that by this means 160,000 acres of this land can be reclaimed by the Sun River alone.

Mention might be made to many more similar projects, such as the construction of a simple canal from the Missouri River to irrigate Chestnut Valley, south of Great Falls, whereby 120,000 acres would be reclaimed; or one from the Upper Madison River whereby 230,000 acres of the Madison Valley might receive water, but the foregoing will suffice to show the possibilities of irrigation development in Montana.

It would be doing the resources of a great and vast area of Montana injustice if reference were not made to the Milk River country, the great Indian reservation of 17,680,000 acres in the northern part of the State which has recently been open to settlement. This region has not been examined by the author, but from conversations with a number of its well-informed inhabitants it appear that the soil is very fertile, and that during average moist years excellent crops can be raised there without irrigation. This last statement, however, should not be too readily accepted. It is probable that some storage water may be retained in the hills along the British line, though its development will doubtless involve international questions.

A GLANCE AT THEFUTURE.

This interesting subject cannot be passed by without a little castle building, and accordingly an attempt will be made to show what the future of Montana may owe to irrigation.

It has just been shown how and where 1,750,000 acres may be added to the area at present under cultivation; many times this amount, however, can be reclaimed. Settled as closely as a large irrigated district would naturally be, these 1,750,000 acres will be increased by about 15 per cent. or 262,500 acres, the area which will be occupied by roads, buildings, and towns; that is to say over 2,000,000 acres will be rendered capable of sustaining the highest degree of settlement, though in reality this amount will be much greater since a large portion of the land will not be directly irrigated, since it will indirectly receive sufficient moisture from the neighboring fields to render it serviceable for pasturage.

It has been claimed by various authorities that a homestead of forty acres is abundant for the support of a family, assuming this estimate to be correct, then 2,000,000 acres will support 50,000 families; at five persons each this would give a farm population of 250,000. This number of farm workers would require a town and village population of one and one-half more, or our 2,000,000 acres would add in all 375,000 people to the State.

On the same basis the 18,000,000 acres which have been classified as irrigable land, (and this estimate is below that of the Montana Society of civil engineers and other authorities), would support 3,120,000 inhabitants.

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