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Show Subterranean Waters in Utah. Report Issued by United States Geological Survey in Coopera- j tion with State Engineer. An investigation of the under-; round water resources of Juab, j Millard, and Iron counties, in the , western part of Utah, has been , carried on by 0. E. Meinzer, of j the United States Geological Sur- vey, in cooperation with the1 State engineer, and is discussed I in Water-Supply Puper 277, just issued by the Survey. The object ob-ject of the work has been of course to obtain and disseminate information which should lead to ! a greater utilization of the ground-water supplies. The agricultural development of an arid section, such as this, j is primarily dependent on the amount of water available. Large tracts of fertile soil remain idle year after year for lack of water for irrigation, while much water that falls as rain and snow sinks into the ground, saturates the porous materials underlying the valleys and eventually reappears reap-pears at the surface in low alkali flats where it is dissipated by evaporation without producing useful vegetation. If the water thus lost can be applied to fertile soil it will substantially increase the agricultural yield of the region. re-gion. An urgent demand for infor-1 infor-1 mation in regard to ground-water prospects ha6 been created in recent re-cent years by the adoption of dry farming methods in localities; where water is not readily ob-1 tained. The water retnii red for culinary purposes and for supply-j ing the horses and traction en-1 gines used in tilling the soil on some of the dry farms is at present pres-ent hauled long distances. In most of the arid parts of this region watering places of any sort are so scarce that cer- tain sections are accessible for f grazing only in the winter, when sheep will depend on snow for their water supply. In some of these sections, according to Mr. Meinzer, an intelligent search would probably discover- groundwater ground-water supplies which woould increase in-crease greatly the value of the range. 'GREAT PREHISTORIC LAKE. In tracing the early geologic history of the region which in- eludes the ' present Great Salt 1 Lake, Mr. Meinzer gives an in- Jj tercsting discussion of the prehistoric pre-historic Lake Bonneville, a great inland sea which in ancient times covered an area of nearly 20,000 square miles, a tract twice as ! large as the land surface of the "H State of Maryland. The lake was 846 miles long, measured in a I straight line, by 145 miles wide, P and its surface was about 1,000 feet above the present level of I Great Salt Lake. The report is a comprehensive volume of 150 j pages, discusses in detail the wa- ter resources of the entire area, I and contains a topographic sketch map of Juab and Millard counties, coun-ties, and also a fine topographic : map of the Fish Springs quadrangle. quad-rangle. A copy of the report may be obtained free on applica- ' tion to the Director, United States Geological Survey, Wash- ' ington, D. C. |