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Show I IRRIGATION IN CANADA. The dispatches this morning convey the newB of tho washing out of the great dam which the Canadian Pacific Railway company put in the Saskatchewan Saskatche-wan river for reservoir and irrigation purposes. It will bo a serious loss, and may interfere with the railroad company's com-pany's programme to begin an extensive exten-sive system of Irrigation enterprises the present season, This plan contemplated the calling for canal construction In the whole Interior In-terior plateau east of the main western rango. Thu beginning was to he mado at Calgary, and with tho success of that, the plana providod for further work,' which ln the end would reclaim over three million acres of land. It Is a great plain, with gentle slope toward Hudson's Bay, and littles difficulty was to be oxpeotod save just a3 Ik now reported re-ported to have happened, in the washing wash-ing out of dams In the main streams, In the flood season. But this will only mean that those dams will have to be made firmer and stronger. The initial work of the company contemplated con-templated the Irrigation of three hundred hun-dred thousand acres, and the railroad would attend also to colonizing the land, dividing it into convenient holdings. hold-ings. The land is fertile, and of the whole area covered by the entire scheme, half of the acreage a million five hundred thousand acres Is to be devoted to the raising of grain, tho other million and a 'half acres to be devoted to grass and pasturage. It was expected that the letting of contracts for the Initial work at Calgary Cal-gary would be called for at once, but this may be delayed by the dlsnster reported. re-ported. Two canals aro to be used to '"(5"IK lilt HUH, 11 umiii UUIHll iniiiy- five miles long with a width at bottom of sixty feet and carrying ton feet depth of water. This will be built first and will be used to carry water to the secondary sec-ondary canal, which, when complted, will be 116 miles long. To make tho main canal, 250,000.000 cubic feet of earth will bQ removed. Tho work will be done by. steam shovels,, etc. The project Is claimed to be the largest of the kind over attempted on the continent. |
