VOL.LX.
INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST 19, 1905.
NO. 33
HUOE WYOMING DAM.
Edltora Indiana Fanner:
A quarter of a century ago the home
of tlie buffalo, and later a cattle and
sheep pasture, with au occasional ranch
house, the Big Horn Rosin in Wyoming
is now the scene of a great activity incident to the building of oue of the largest
of the government irrigation works.
Some years ago Colonel Cody, better
known as Buffalo Bill, made a survey ot
the Shoshone canyon and in connection
v>ith General lUuis projected a company
to construct a dam and irrigate some
00,000 acres. The necessary capital, however, was not forthcoming and when the
national irrigation law was passed, the
government took up the proposition and
a large party of engineers has since been
employed on the preliminaries of a great
work of desert reclamation.
The Shoshone River dashes down a narrow canyon, with jagged and perpendicular walls, and at its narrowest point the
government has begun the construction
of the highest dam ever built. It will cement together the two canyon walls for
240 feet above the stream bed and its
foundation will go below the water line
88 feet additional, down to the solid bed
rock. The stream, where it passes between these granite canyon walls, is but
00 feet wide and the dam will form a
great lake of 5,000 acres, with a watershed of 1,250 square miles, storing enough
water to irrigate 150,000 acres through
seven miles of 14 foot tunnels bored in
the solid rock.
— No Chance for Land Grabbing. —
This will cost about $25 dollars an
acre to be paid back to the government
by the settlers under the business-like
provisions of the irrigation law. The land
itself is free under the homestead act and
has Ibeen reserved by Secretary Hitchcock from entry under the Desert and
other land laws not requiring actual residence and home-building.
Few such picturesque and wildly beautiful scenes can be found a's this Shoshone canyon. The river is a succession
of foaming, rushing rapids, the water
coursing along in a deep green flood and
then boiling over great rocks and boulders
in a white surge. Only for a few hours
each day the sun finds its way to tlie bottom of this deeply out gorge, the mountain sides towering into the clouds two
and three thousand feet. From above
the dam site as one looks down at the engineers working on tlie foundations, directly underneath, they appear like mimic men.
— Great Forces of Nature. —
This Shoshone canyon and its surrounding mountains are one of nature's great
handiworks. All has been cut out by
the silver stream, rushing in its bed below. For countless ages it has eaten its
way through granite and limestone, wearing, wearing, wearing away. For centuries and ages it has flowed, ceaselessly
and likewise uselessly on its way to join
the flood of the Missouri; now it is to be
harnessed and made to produce for man.
A thousand farmers will make prosperous homes for themselves and families
and raise an annual product of a couple
or three million dollars.
In the canyon's middle, below the dam
of nature have wrought wonderfully.
Enormous granite Shoulders have detached
themselves from the mountains and rolled
down thousands of feet, crashing their
hundreds and thousands of tons into the
rocky gorge. Here the river continually
plays upon them, searching out the seams
and  splitting tbem  up or  wearing  them
away and polishing them smooth.
— The Itock Pile of the World. —
lu the canyon's middle below the dam
site, the jungle of rocks in the uarrow
river bed appears as though a thousand
blasts of giant powder had rent the mountain sides nnd tumbled every rugged pro-
jectibn into the depths below. -The imperishable granite, gray, pink, and varicolored, oldest    of the    geological forma-
flew in all directions and a great splash
of water rose like a geyser out of tlie
black depths of the canyon into the sunlight lu a majestic white spray. Yet this
huge block of granite wns but a baby addition to tlie family of boulders which
had been detached by the more giant
forces ot nature and thrown into the river
bed. A few hours [before, I had crawled
directly nnder this rock in my canyon
"exploration."    Iteturoing I  was  fain to
For a thousand years longer this splendid dam site would likely stand idle before private capital would develop it to
its magnificent full capacity, for the difficulties in the way of tlie engineers are
many and unknown; but the government
will meet all obstacles and overcome
them and finally turn over to a thousand
farmers a perfect jot* of engineering,
comparable to the great works of the
Peruvian Iticas, the Egyptian Barneses or
the British engineers of India-—an enduring inovenint for all time to the wisdom
of the present generation, of Americans.
Guy Elliott Mitchell.
gxpcricucc gjejmKtmeut
HOW TO SECURE GOOD FALL PASTURE.
Shoshone   Government Dam Site.    Jeremiah    Ahern,    Supervising
Engineer,  U. S. Reclamation Service, in charge.
tions, made by the welding of various
suostances when the globe was a molten
mass; the later limestone and the black
volcanic rocks, conglomerates also melted
b.v great heat, the hard red sandstone
and its white and brown contemporaries,
formed from the grinding of other rock*
subjected to enormous pressure, and lastly the geyserites and sulphur rocks, soft
and honeycombed, the result of ceaseless
spoutings of steam and hot water from
the earth's bowels—al are found in wonderful profusion.
Below the canyon where the river runs
more peacefully, all these formations are
represented in the huge beds of cobble
stones and smaller Imulders over which
the water plays. The cobble stones were
themselves once jagged rocks, detached
by wind, water, frost, and sun from their
mountain bases and rolled and ground by
river force until all their sharp corners
have been worn: and polished away.
— A Giant Fire Cracker. —
Watching the gorernment engineers
cutting a road along the side of the canyon for the transportation of supplies to
build the dam—00,000 barrels of cement
Hlone will be needed—I observed the explosion of a big charge of dynamite,
which burst with a roar echoing up and
down the canyon deafening reverberations
Immediately an oblong granite rock of
some 150 tons weight was torn from its
base and hurled down into the river a
hiuderd  feet    below.    Shatters    ot rock
accept the assistance of ono of the road
builders in getting across this place, looking down the while into the river boiling
below among the rocks.
'If you slip, you can get out a quarter
of a mile down stream," remarked one of
the dynamiters cheerfully, as I passed my
camera over and was inching across the
slippery six feet, clinging to the canyon |
side.
The engineering credit for this great
project with its great dam, its enormous
spillways, its mountain road building and
its miles of canals and huge tunnels bored
through the solid rock is due to Jeremiah
Anern, a government district engineer
who, nlmost cut off from the outside
world, has taken up his residence for several years in this wild canyon once a fastness of the Shoshone Indians.
— National Irrigation. —
What does all this great irrigation work
of the government throughout the
west signify? Simply that the nation
has wisely decided to use the money derived from the sale of western public lands
to make its desert soil of value and furnish many home-building opportunities.
It means that many men will find employment in the construction of dams and
canals in every western community, and
tiiat finally as the works are completed
one by one, new farm homes will be'established, adding to the nation's wealth and
balancing our population now inclined
cityward.
Orchard Grass is Excellent.
1st Premium.—The question of plenty
of good fall pasture is important, since it
is this season of the year that our stock
is prepared for tlie severe winter weather. If we have a liberal supply of! good
pasture during August, September and
October, our stock will go into winter
in good condition and a great saving of
feed will be the result.
In winter we must feed for a three-fold
purpose; to produce growth, fat anil
heat. If the animal goes into Uie winter
in good condition it will take much less
feed to beep it than if it is allowed to run
down during the fall on account of a lack
of good supply of pasture.
I have found orchard grass to be excellent for this purpose. It makes a
rank growth at this season of the year,
and is easily grown. It may be sown
on wheat ground in September, after the
wheat is sown, or in March, at the rate
o£ 15 pounds to the acre. I have had
no trouble in securing a stand, and it becomes thicker on the ground each year.
In an emergency, rye may be sown in
August, and it may be kept pastured
down until freezing weather and will
make a good crop of rye the following
season. Sorgum may be sown in the
spring, and cut with a binder and fed to
milch cows during the fall season. Rape
makes an excellent fall pasture for sheep
and hogs. I believe that in many cases
it would be better for our soil if we
would keep our clover fields for pasture
after cutting off the hay crop, rather than
taking off a seed crop thus impoverishing
the soil. The prudent farmer will study
bis soil and the needs of his flocks and
lienls, and will provide pasture during tha
fall   season. J.   C.   K.
Noblo Co.
Prepare  A Good   Seed Bed.
2d Premium.—Why do our grasses for
fall pasture fail so generally? This is the
tenor of numerous inquiries by farmers.
In the first place, very little of our soil
is properly prepared for seeding to grasses. The habit of shallow plowing unfortunately prevails in many portions of
the state. Most of our grasses for pasture are deep feeding, and with this
method of plowing on stiff, heavy lands,
if the grass starts at all; it cannot secure
a firm en-nugh hold on the soil to withstand a severe drouth. Such lands
should be gradually broken down to eight
or ten inches deep, and subsoiled from
four to six inehes below this. Then
tlie seesl bed should lie put in the finest
possible tilth by constant and thorough
cultivation. When the land is rough,
lumpy nnd dry,    as very often happens,
Continued on page nine.