100 Bulletin No. 34. 



THE "ADOBE HOLE." 



No. 14, April 15. 



In early times, when there were but few settlers, and each 

 man was welcome to a continuous flow of water in his ditches, 

 there was no need to store water for stock in the artificial ponds 

 commonly known as "adobe holes" or "stock water tanks." 

 But when increasing irrigation made it necessary to shut off the 

 run of water from each ditch in turn, the farmers of the Salt River 

 valley met the emergency by digging tanks large enough to hold 

 sufficient water for their animals while their ditches were dry. 



The device was cheap, and met the emergency; but there is 

 serious question as to whether it should be permanently adopted. 

 The adobe holes in Arizona are nearly all found in the Salt River 

 valley. There are very few in the Buckeye country and on the 

 upper Gila they are practically unknown. A recent count by an 

 employee of the Experiment Station discovered 338 stock water 

 tanks south of Salt River, and 291 to the north— -a total of 629. 

 The count was made from section lines and doubtless many were 

 not seen. It is safe to say that there are 750 adobe holes in the 

 whole valley. They are much more thickly placed south of the 

 river, especially near Mesa, where the farms are small and many 

 animals are kept. Under the Tempe canal there are very few, 

 provision being there made for a continuous run of stock water. 

 They are especially numerous along the principal laterals, and at 

 the edge of cultivation where water is scarce. North of the river, 

 where the ranches are larger and much grain and fruit are grown, 

 they are fewer. South of Salt River, stock water tanks average 

 4.3 to the section on 79 sections; to the north they average 2.7 on 

 106 sections. 



Such is the why and the where of the adobe hole; but its; 

 merits as a modern institution are seriously in question. 



In the first place the quality of the water for drinking pur- 

 poses, especially at flood-time, is bad. Chemical analysis, and, 

 oftentimes, the evidence of one's own nose and eyes, show it to be 

 full of animal and vegetable impurities swept into the water courses 

 from the surface of the desert. Last November when the river 

 Avas clear and apparently at its best, a sample taken at Point of 



