Creston Soldier's Colony

RETURNED SOLDIERS’ COLONY AT CRESTON – National Service Board Urged To Have Government Drain 25,000 Acres and Settle Returned Heroes on Land – Best of Soil in Tract

            Creston, B.C. Board of Trade is taking up with the National Service Board of Canada, as well as the provincial authorities, a very comprehensive scheme of providing employment for returned soldiers, which, if undertaken, will, when completed, provide also an ideal location under most favorable conditions for those of the veterans who care to follow agriculture as an after-the-war vocation.

            Briefly stated the proposition is to reclaim 25,000 acres of land in Kootenay River Valley, employing returned men on the work and allowing such of them as care to attempt agriculture tracts of the reclaimed land adjoining each other, so as to enable the B.C. Government to put into practical effect the returned soldier farm colony scheme.

            The scheme is one unique in its way, being the uncovering from flood waters of a big inland delta of richest alluvial deposit brought down by the Kootenay River, with its tributaries, draining the whole of the western slopes of the Rocky Mountains in B.C., and the Selkirk ranges, after a bold sweep southward running into the United States as far as Bonners Ferry, Idaho, from that point turns directly north again to B.C. and Kootenay Lake.  At the same time the Lardo River and others run into the lake at the other end and the combined volume of water passes out toward the centre of the Lake by a passage called the West Arm, like the downward stroke of a gigantic T, past Nelson and Bonnington Falls to join the Columbia River.

            The outlet of the West Arm is, however, so restricted to size that it is unable to cope with the enormous volume of water which every spring rushes down from the melting snows of this vast watershed, with the result that Kootenay Lake itself is formed, for the time being, into an inland sea, raising its level during June and July at times 20 feet above its normal height.  When this takes place the Kootenay River meets this flood-tide at its entrance to the Lake heavily laden with earthy matter from the mountain, deposits them there, a film of fertility which in the course of unknown geological time has become a bed a hundred feet in depth of richest alluvial soil.

            The reclamation has solely to do with the enlarging of the Lake’s outlet.  In 1913 a preliminary survey was made by Engineer Muerling, who in his findings reported favorably on the project but asked for a more thorough examination of the whole territory before making a final decision.  With the outbreak of the war the next year the scheme was, for the time being, abandoned.  American engineers have also spent two seasons on the work and their report, made public about two months ago, was strongly in favor of the work being proceeded with, the estimated cost being little over $2,000,000.

            The fertility of the soil has been proven.  In years, when the snowfall is light, and there is no flooding, these lands readily yield 100 bushels of oats, 65 bushels of wheat and 15 tons of potatoes to the acre.  Including the Idaho area almost 65,000 acres would be reclaimed, and that State pledged to pay its pro rata per acre cost of the work.