vestment has paid for itself the first year.

I ought to mention that I have a driven well, with a four-and-a-half inch Cook's strainer for a point, and as it gets into quicksand or coarse gravel the water flows in very freely. Indeed, I believe it is nearly if not quite equal to an open well, for the pump lifts about the same amount of water that the manufacturers claim it should lift in an open well, which would be too costly here, owing to the quicksands.

So far as I am able to form an opinion, I am inclined to think that where more than small gardens of one or two acres are to be irrigated, a gasoline engine would, on the whole, prove more satisfactory than a windmill. It is true that the running expenses would be greater, but the initial cost would be less. Moreover, after the first forty-eight hours run, one is able to form a pretty accurate estimate of the amount of land that it will be safe to put under crops, whereas, with a windmill, one has a very uncertain element to contend with, necessitating a much larger reservoir so as to provide against calm weather.

FRO

CALIFORNIA'S ORCHARDS.

BY W. C. FITZSIMMONS.

ROM the different county assessors returns the following figures of orchard trees in California are taken and may be regarded as wholly reliable. In two counties, Yolo and Sierra, the number of non-bearing trees does not appear in the assessors' report, but leaving those out the number of bearing fruit trees in the state is found to be 15,170,563, and those not yet of bearing age, 14,487,869; making a grand total of 29,658,432 fruit trees in the orchards of California on the first day of March of the present year. By adding By adding to the list of non-bearing trees the probable number in Sierra and Yolo, the total list of trees would be swelled to a round

thirty million at least, and that figure may be taken as the official enumeration of the fruit trees now growing in the orchards of this state. The banner county is Santa Clara, whose principal town is San Jose, sixty miles from San Francisco. This county has 2.631,745 bearing fruit trees and 1,933,804 not yet bearing. Of these 1,651,167 are bearing prune trees and 1,456,967 non-bearing prune trees. This regal county also has 539,612 apricot trees

and 522,776 peach trees. The cherry trees number 159,263, the pear trees 142, 779 and the lemon trees 1,354.

Los Angeles county stands second on the list with 734,675 bearing, and 1,911,030 non-bearing fruit trees. The princi

pal factors in this vast aggregate are as follows: orange trees. 751,575; lemon, 287,715; prune, 346,595; olive, 252,940; apricot 227,410; almond, 172,850; walnut, 140,675; peach, 315,400; apple, 77,380.

Riverside county ranks third in the number of its fruit trees, the total being 1,855,902, of which 841,132 are orange, and 133,772 lemon trees. The apple, apricot, peach, cherry, fig, olive, prune, plum, almond and walnut are also well represented in Riverside county, the planting of these varieties having increased greatly during the past three years.

San Bernardino county follows close to Riverside with 1,753,720 fruit trees, of which 1,001,410 are orange and 41,000 lemon trees.

San Diego county has most lemon trees, that being a favorite product of the southernmost county in the state. The total number of fruit trees in that county is 1,235,076 of which 375,372 are lemon trees.

One of the remarkable features of the assessors reports referred to above, is the fact that Butte county has 160,430 orange and 1,930 lemon trees, all growing and most of them bearing fruit within a few miles of the eternal snows of the Sierra Nevada mountains, and five hundred miles north of the smiling citrus orchards of sunny San Diego. In fact the unpoetical figures of the county assessors but serve to strengthen the conviction that the state of California, with its infinite variety of soil, climate and conditions, is soon destined to be recognized as the world's great fruit orchard.

Marketing.-Common sense and good judgment must be brought into full play in marketing your products, of whatever kind. The profits are all found, if there are any, in the last dollars you receive as the price ranges from low to high.

Leave the irrigating ditch in good order when you shut off the water and it will save you needless worry and trouble when you turn the water in next time.

Japan is only importing 25 per cent. of its requirements now, as against 67 per cent. six years ago. This fairly illustrates how the gold standard is not opening the markets of the world to our manufacturers. It is developing the industries of all silverusing countries and destroying the industries of the United States.

Money of ultimate redemption in a -county printing office-gold, silver, copper, brass, fenceposts, hay, grain, live. stock, potatoes, wood piles, sawhorses, fishpoles, bedclothing, old hats, carrots, anything and everything in fact. Bring in a wheelbarrow load.-Mt. Pleasant (Utah) Pyramid.

For the past few months the University of Illinois has been furnishing Pasteurized milk and cream to families in Champaign and Urbana. The greatest care is taken in its preparation, and the floor of the dairy barn is flooded and scrubbed every day. The undertaking is meeting with great favor.

The manager for an Australian enterprise for exporting live cattle to England admits they have no chance of competing

The

with North American raised beef. longer passage required injuriously affects. the quality and appearance.

Minnesota creameries turned off 27,000,000 pounds of butter in 1895. The proportion of creameries using the separator process has increased from 45 per cent. to 60 per cent. of the whole, and those operated on the co-operative plan from 42 to 60 per cent.

During May, the exports from the United States were $66,525. 169, as against $64,267,179 in May, 1895. For eleven months -ending May 31st, they were $815,971,764, against $752,570,335 for the corresponding months last year.

Four thousand boxes of pears and plums, the first shipped this year, reached

London by the steamer St. Louis on the 23d of July in perfect condition and sold for handsome prices. California fruit is

gaining in popular approval.

A visitation of army worms in the eastern states is a new experience, and in several localities the damage has been very great, and in some of the cranberry bogs almost irreparable.

The French prune crop of the Pacific states is exceptionally fine in size and quality this year, and is estimated at 35,000,000 to 40,000,000 pounds.

It is no loss of time to give the boys and the hired man an occasional outing. It affords rest for them and breeds good feeling for you.

Watch closely and be prompt to eradicate every disease that appears, no matter how radical a remedy may be necessary.

A ton of well cured corn fodder has nearly as great a feeding value as a ton of average hay. It should not be wasted.

Time spent at the county fair is about as good an investment as the farmers cau make of it for himself and his family.

When cattle reject corn fodder it is because there has been something wrong about the cutting and curing of it.

Many varieties of fruits and vegetables are excellent for home use that are not profitable to send to the market.

Many western packing houses are closed, there being a very limited demand for products, despite the low prices.

Sixteen white chickens and one black one hatched in one brood have been exhibited at Springfield, Mo.

The good wife is just as much entitled to have extra help when there is extra work as is the good husband.

There are about 200 different shapes of tooth pulling forceps-veritable pain-producers.

Some farmers produce at less cost than others. Why? It is worth thinking about.

Ninety five thousand tons of American apples find a market in England every

year.

Vast quantities of American canned salmon are to be shipped to England this year.

WHY THE AGE IS LATE.

Tfrom Chicago, occasioned by sickness,

HE enforced absence of the publisher,

is the cause of THE AGE being a little later this month than usual. The next number, however, will be out on time.

The editorial discussion on "The Progress of Western America" will appear in the next issue as usual.

WE

WYOMING'S BOLD APPEAL.

E favor laws in aid of irrigation. We need settlers to open our mines, to make homes on the millions of acres of irrigable and fertile public land, to develop and utilize all our immense but unused resources.

If the great rivers which now run to waste were diverted and used, if the valleys which border them were reclaimed and occupied, it would add hundreds of thousands to our population and hundreds of millions to our taxable wealth. It would stop the drain of money sent each year to surrounding states to purchase farm products, revive trade in our cities and towns, lighten the burden of taxes and afford employment to our idle labor. To secure these results and aid those who reclaim and make productive these unoccupied wastes, we favor legislation by the general government in aid of irrigation. We believe that every dollar paid for desert land should be returned to the state and expended on ditches and reservoirs to make those and other lands productive.

The

We recognize the need of laws to protect and preserve our mountain forests, and favor legislation to that end. present forest reserve law prevents the legitimate and harmless use of timber by settlers, prevents the ownership or development of mines in reserved areas, and does nothing to protect the forest from fire-the chief agent of its destruction.

We favor laws for the preservation of the native grasses on the open range, and laws which will give to the citizens and taxpayers of this state the exclusive right to occupy and use the ranges within its

borders and protect their homes against the invasion of flocks and herds from other states when owned by non-residents and those who pay taxes elsewhere.

Adopted in Republican convention, Cheyenne, Wyo., August 13, 1896.

DELEGATES TO THE CONGRESS.

The following gentlemen have been appointed by the governors of their respective states as delegates to the Fifth National Irrigation Congress.

Oklahoma-J. V. Adm re, Kingfisher; Henry E. Glazier, Stillwater; G. W. Batchelder, Newkirk.

Oregon-Chas. Hilton, The Dalles; J. M. Church, La Grande; John D. Young, Baker City; W. F. Matlock, Pendleton; A. W. Gowan, Burns.

California-Hon. C. C. Wright, Modesto; H. R. McDonald, formerly State Treasurer; E. G. Knapp, San Francisco.

Montana-Z. T. Burton, Burton; Paris Gibson, Great Falls; J. B. Collins, Miles City; Matt Anderson, Bozeman; Donald Bradford, Helena.

IRRIGATION IN CENTRAL AMERICA. BY JOHN R. CHANDLER.

C

ENTRAL America has taken a decided step in the last year or so towards the development of resources of every kind, and in so doing has opened up a number of markets for American goods, machinery, and especially enterprises in railroading, canal building and irrigation.

The coffee crop this year will surely be double of last year's and worth fully $25,000,000, but Guatemala alone has a vast series of plateaus in its central basin which, once given over to irrigation on American principles, would more than double the yearly value of its present exports, in tobacco, sisal hemp or henequer and several other fibres, sugar, cocoa, etc. The plains of Zocapa are easily accessible from the Rio Grande or Motagua river, and irrigation need be no more costly than in our western states.

This territory is now being opened upby the Northern or Interoceanic Railroad,

which is being built through the central portion of Guatemala, mostly by American engineers and workmen.

The Central American Exposition, to be held next year in Guatemala City, under the direction of Dr. Guzman (who was at Chicago), is expected to attract many foreigners, and above all, Americans, as the exhibits will not only be rich but unique. Many of our manufacturers have already signified their intention to send exhibits and European countries are all alive to the advantages this fair may give them in showing of their goods.

NEVADA

Owing to the unusually dry weather which prevailed in eastern Nevada during the winter there will be no grain crop to speak of in that part of the state as the farmers, fearing a shortage in the water supply did not sow. However the alfalfa and wild hay crop is large, the latter being better in the Humboldt River Valley than for several years past, due to the unusually heavy spring storms which caused the river to overflow its banks in June and July.

The short water supply in the earlier part of the season and until the middle of June this year, at Lovelock, on the lower Humboldt River, one of the richest farming districts of the state, has aroused the farmers to the necessity of storing water as a safeguard against the recurrence of this condition, and a search will be made for a suitable site for a storage reservoir. The loss of the grain crop in this district alone this year would have more than paid the cost of providing such storage.

Within the past two years three new flouring mills have been erected in the state, and before long, instead of shipping out wheat and importing flour from California, Nevada will be manufacturing all of this article she consumes.

Present indications are that before the next number of THE AGE is out work will have been commenced on what is to be one of the largest storage reservoirs in the country, on one of the main tributaries of the Humboldt River. This reservoir will have a surface area of 3670 acres and a capacity of 80,000 actual feet. It will be formed by a rock-fill dam faced with earth, having a height above the stream bed of 85 feet, a length at base of 115 feet and on top of 240 feet. The water shed which will supply this reservoir has an area of over 750 square miles ranging in altitude

from 5,000 feet to 11,000 feet above sea level, and yielding ample water to fill it. There are over 200,000 acres of fine land under this reservoir in the Humboldt River Valley, a portion of which will be irrigated from it and placed upon the market at a very low price.

KANSAS IRRIGATION CONVENTION.

By authority of the State Executive Committee, the fourth annual meeting of the Kansas Irrigation Congress is hereby called to meet at Great Bend, Kansas, on the 15th, 16th and 17th of October, 1896.

Eight years of drouth and crop failures have riveted the attention of farmers and gation is the only salvation of the Great all classes of people to the fact that irriPlains country. Texas, Colorado, Oklakoma, Nebraska and the Dakotas are pressing forward with unbated zeal towards the reclamation of their lands by irrigation.

Kansas is not one whit behind any of them. She points with pride to the work already done. Within her borders over 2,500 private irrigation plants have been put in since this agitation was begun, besides thousands of farmers have been induced to try irrigation in a small way, which insures them a living outside of their farming.

The Kansas State Board of Irrigation will be here to give an account of their stewardship.

No person should be absent from this meeting who can possibly come. Every town, city and township in the state should be represented. Every person coming will be considered a delegate. The ladies are especially invited. All can have their "say " and ask as many questions on the various subjects as they de

sire.

The railroads have made one-fare rates in the state of Kansas, Kansas City and St. Joe, Mo., included, excursion tickets to be sold Oct. 14 to 16 inclusive, good to return until Oct. 19, 1896. Tickets to be good for going passage commencing date of sale and for continuous passage in each direction.

Great Bend has ample hotel accommodations and can take care of all who come. L. Baldwin, Local Secretary; John H. Churchill, President; H. N. Lester, Secretary State Irrigation Congress; John E. Frost, Chairman State Executive Committee; E. R. Moses, Chairman Local Executive Committee.

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