Saskatchewan

a province of western Canada. It extends northward from the border line of Montana and North Dakota to the sixtieth parallel of latitude. It lies between Alberta and Manitoba. The land area is 242,322 square miles; the water area, 8,318 square miles. Aside from the river valleys, which are broken and channeled with time, the greater part of the surface is an undulating prairie having much the appearance of northern Iowa. Extensive tracts are covered with a dark, mellow, fertile vegetable loam, the product of ages of prairie vegetation.

CLIMATE. Speaking for the southern and central, the occupied, portion of the province, the climate cannot be essentially different from that of North Dakota, but partisans claim that it is modified by chinook winds from the Rockies and the Pacific. Local writers avoid giving extremes. The mean temperature of February, founded on observations taken for a number of years, may be placed at 4.6 deg. F.; that of July at 63.4 deg. F. The total average rainfall varies from fifteen to nineteen inches a year. The average is placed at 17.20 inches. Snows are seldom deep. The heaviest rains come in early summer during the period of growing crops.

STOCK RAISING. Native grasses furnish excellent summer pasturage. They cure on the stalk, as is the case in western Dakota, Montana, and Idaho, affording winter feed in abundance. Except during short and rare periods of heavy snowfall, cattle run out in winter and gather their own feed. The growth of the stock-raising industry in Saskatchewan may be shown conveniently:

1901 1908

AGRICULTURE. The province is destined to become one of the famous food-producing regions of the world. Immense plains free from obstruction facilitate the use of machinery and encourage extensive cultivation. Root crops do well. Wheat is the standard moneymaking crop. All grains are sown in the spring. The yield in bushels of cereals for 1909 was:

This yield places Saskatchewan in the third rank among the provinces of the Dominion and states of the Union as a producer of wheat and oats. Minnesota, with 94,000,000 bushels, and North Dakota, with 90,700,000 bushels, are the only states that produced more wheat in 1909 than did Saskatchewan. Minnesota's average yield was 16.8 bushels, North Dakota's was 13.7, Satskatchewan's 22.1, Kansas' 14.1, and the United States' 15.8.

Illinois and Iowa were the only states that produced more oats than did Saskatchewan in 1909, their production being 159,000,000 bushels and 116,000,000 bushels respectively, as against Saskatchewan's 105,465,000 bushels. Illinois' average yield was 36.6 bushels and Iowa's 27, Saskatchewan's 47.1, Minnesota's 33, and the United States' 30.3 bushels an acre.

The total area in grain crops for 1909 was 6,898,559 acres and the average acreage of grain crops to the farm for the province was 84.9 acres. The acreage of all crops in Saskatchewan in 1909 was 7,016,272. Saskatchewan produced nearly one-eighth as much wheat as did the United States and more than one-tenth as much oats. The average price on the farm for all grades of wheat was eighty-four cents a bushel, which means that the wheat crop was worth $75,814,000 to the producers. The oats crop, at an average price of twenty-six cents a bushel, was worth $27,420,000. The total value on the farm of all grain, roots, and fodder crops raised in Saskatchewan in 1909, together with that of milk and its products, was $132,539,242.

HISTORY. Territorial rights were purchased by Canada from the Hudson Bay Company in 1869. Saskatchewan was made a district in 1882. It was made a province of the Dominion of Canada in 1905. Settlers are pouring into the plains of Saskatchewan to engage in wheat farming and stock raising. The population is increasing rapidly. In 1901 there were 91,460 inhabitants; in 1906, 263,713; and in 1908, there were 335,721. Regina is the capital of Saskatchewan. Moosejaw, Prince Albert, and Battleford are all prosperous towns. A system of public schools has been established. The railroads of the province are the Canadian Pacific, the Canadian Northern, and the Grand Trunk Pacific.