Turning Sagebrush Into $100-an-Acre Orchards With Artesian Water

E. F. Burt of the Pacific Land and Artesian Company is home from North Yakima. Mr. Burt reports that the company now has four flowing artesian wells, and is purposing to sink others. The wells are located at a point four miles from North Yakima, in the Moxee valley. They average a depth of 1,000 feet and the pressure of water is 60 pounds to the square inch. They each flow an average of 3 cubic feet per second, and each will water about 80 acres of land. The water of these wells is of a temperature of 72 degrees Fahrenheit, and rises about 6 inches above the top of the well. The wells cost about $5 a foot, or $5,000 each well.

The profit for digging is large, as each turns 80 acres of desert land into land that is worth $100 an acre, and at this rate the profit is nearly $3,000 a well. The company intends to bore several other wells as it has 19,900 acres on which it intends to put water. It is the intention to make the wells of larger bore. Hitherto the wells have been 6 inches in diameter, but hereafter they will be 8 inches. It is thought that each well will water 1,000 or 1,500 acres.

For the first 100 feet the borers strike soil. The next 200 feet is through sandstone and clay. Then 15 feet of basalt tries the patience of the borers. The rest of the 1,000 feet through limestone and shale gives up the water. Bark-er & Stevens, bankers of the First National Bank of North Yakima, have already sunk two wells on their farm near North Yakima. They are now at work on a third well. On their place they only have to bore 500 feet to strike flowing water.

It is the intention to go extensively into the dairy and stock-raising business in that district, as four or five crops a year of alfalfa can be raised and it furnishes excellent feed for horses and cattle.