Report on the lands of the arid region of the United States, with a more detailed account of the lands of Utah

by John Wesley Powell; Willis Drummond; Clarence E. Dutton; Grove Karl Gilbert; A. H. Thompson

REGULAR DIVISION LINES FOR PASTURAGE FARMS NOT PRACTICABLE.

Many a brook which runs but a short distance will afford sufficient water for a number of pasturage farms; but if the lands are surveyed in regular tracts as square miles or townships, all the water sufficient for a number of pasturage farms may fall entirely within one division. If the lands are thus surveyed, only the divisions having water will be taken, and the farmer obtaining title to such a division or farm could practically occupy all the country adjacent by owning the water necessary to its use. For this reason divisional surveys should conform to the topography, and be so made as to give the greatest number of water fronts. For example, a brook carrying water sufficient for the irrigation of 200 acres of land might be made to serve for the irrigation of 20 acres to each of ten farms, and also supply the water for all the stock that could live on ten pasturage farms, and ten small farmers could have homes. But if the water was owned by one man, nine would be excluded from its benefits and nine-tenths of the land remain in the hands of the government.