Show I MILLARD IRRIGATION I JIll GllinS OtTLIXES THE POMOY i OF THE COMPANY A Rich Section of Country AVill Bo Brought Under Cult Objections Ob-jections That Arc Said to Be Baseless Base-less DESERET Dec 2 18J5In your issue is-sue of the 29th ultimo there appears under the heading Millard Irrigation Scheme an article which no doubt unintentionally did this county an injustice in-justice and we are sure The Herald I will cheerfully give space to a correction correc-tion of the misapprehension that might be drawn from the article in question I Beginning at Leamington and following fol-lowing the contour of the base of the mountain southerly to Kanosh is one I of the finest agricultural tracts in Utah A canal fifty feet wide on the bottom and six feet deep will tap the Sevier river several miles above Leam ington and following the contour above indicated will bring the tract under cultivation The distance to be traversed by the canal about seventy miles The land under the canal survey sur-vey varies from a sandy loam to strong heavy clays and a black loam I The tract does not encroach on the bench sufficiently to be encumbered I with boulders and is far enough from the mountains to be outside of the deep snow limit The soil will produce pro-duce any kind of grain or fruit that can be grown anywhere in central Uiah As the canal is extended < southward south-ward its size will be diminished in proportion to the demands of the area uo be watered During the fall winter win-ter and early spring months tUbe wa tel from the canal can be turned on itens of thousands of acres of bottomlands bottom-lands and rich pasturage produced At the head of the canal is a fine reservoir site and there are two others near Oak City that can be utilized for bottlom land I With the completion of the canal a large proportion of the water that runs to waste in the Sevier river and that now forms a dead saline lake will be used in making homes for 25000 to 50000 people It is a magnificent magnifi-cent enterprise and one that will require re-quire united pluck to accomplish but which is well worth the labor that will be necessary to complete If the people peo-ple will not build the canal abundant outside capital is ready and anxious for the chance to invest Your correspondent causes The Herald Her-ald to say The engineers however have reported that the Sevier would fill the canal up in a short time and that it will not be a success It is doubted by the writer if the engineers ever made such a statement If BO they should exchange their surveying instruments for grubbing hoes and seek employment Ithat will prove less taxing on their brains It is inferred the idea intended to be conveyed was that the canal would be filled up with silt brought down by the flood waiters of the Sevier The same objection could be laid against every canal along I the river That they do not thus fill up is all the negative argument necessary If the canal now projected should prove to be an exception and there is no I reason why it should it would only be the first few miles from the head and the configuration of the ground is such that a gaite properly situated I would produce such a rapid current as to flush the canal of all sediment It is probable your correspondent mistook mis-took the filling up of the canal for that of the reservoir If ithat be the case there is some ground for the assertion regarding its filling up although it would be a remote contingency and one that can be avoided The same objection ob-jection can be raised against the recently re-cently completed reservoirs near Mrysvale on the upper Sevier and with even more force because of the greater amount of sediment which the river carries at that place and which settles along its sinuous course of perhaps per-haps between 300 and 400 miles before it reaches the Millard reservoir The only way to prevent the filling up of any reservoir through which the Se vier river flows is to build an artificial channel as straight as possible through the reservoir and into which the river could be turned and confined during the flood season when the water wa-ter is carrying an unusual amount of sediment The reservoirs could then be filled during the fall winter and early spring months without the slightest danger of destroying them by i 1 deposits of silt I i Of course an artificial channel would I be somewhat expensive but the not distant future will create such a demand de-mand for homes in Utah that expense will cut but a small figure in the storing stor-ing of water for irrigation Very truly J F GIBBS |