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<br />(JOJ187
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<br />plrmt exhalation and ot.her like chnnne1s.
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<br />THE ClIAITIMAN. When you first put the weter on the lend, it takes
<br />qui te a long time for it to soak through that lend, does it not?
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<br />MR. CARPENTER. Yes, indeed, Mr. Chdrman. The full effect of the
<br />returned su?ply is not manifested in many districts for as fi:;h a.s 10,
<br />15, or 20 years after the initial application takes place.
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<br />iir. Widsell, the noted authority on soils and application of water
<br />at the Uni versi ty of Utah, and now, I believe, the prosi dent of that
<br />insti tution, in his valuable work, says that for ordinary calcu1ati on
<br />it may be sai d that one-half of the ec.rth mass is air; in other words,
<br />it is made up of voids. So that if you tako a tumbler full of soil, for
<br />example, it would be much like a tumbler full of "arbles, and one-half
<br />of the spR.ce of that twnb1er would be occupied by solid matter and one-
<br />hal:' by voids. As the water pours upon the surface of the (;round it
<br />naturally pa3ses down through those voids, aocuIllU1ates below, and raises
<br />the water plane as it existed in nature, so that if the water plane were
<br />raised over a certain area, 10 feet,for example, over what it oriGinally
<br />was, the rou:;h igures there would be that you would have an wlderground
<br />resarvoir of 5 feet in depth of clear water. TLis water, of course, is
<br />added to each year by each year's "pplicr_tion, and it passed out below
<br />into the subterranean channels, cree.ks, and brooks that I have mentioned.
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<br />Frobably the most exhaustive study ever mR.de in the United States
<br />on this subject is just ')ein~ concluded on the South F1atte River, The
<br />South Platte River is what we know us a disappearing river; that is to
<br />say, it incree sed in flow from its upper sources, the snow banks in the
<br />mountains; it increased in flow as it proceeded out toward the foothills
<br />beyond. And when it went into the plains of the Atlantic slope, or the
<br />Great Plains area. it received no more gradual contributions; it Gradu-
<br />ally, under natural conditions, lost itself in the s~nd, so that in the
<br />month of August of each year, for Bxa.mple, it disappeared entirely with-
<br />in 15 to 100 miles east of the mountains; it disappeared, as far as
<br />visible flow of the surface of the stream is conoerned. Tilere is a
<br />stretch of 150 miles from the town of La Salle. Colorado, to Julesburg,
<br />Colorado. Julesber,;; baing riGht at the point where the South F1atte River
<br />crosses into Nebraska, There has been a very careful and thoroughgoing
<br />study mode of that river for a two-year period, conducted jointly by the
<br />State of Colorado and the Department of AI'.ricu1ture, They p1aoed auto-
<br />matio registers on every heR.dgate. on every diversion. ~nd on every
<br />river station.
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<br />The upshot of that study shows that over 1.2, ) second-feet of water
<br />appear in the bed of that stream and are redivertod through that 150-
<br />mile stretch that was originally dry; the 1.200 second-feet of water
<br />"ppear in the hottest hlonth of the summer, where no weter rBn before,
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