230 NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



irrigation on a small scale where yon only liave to run the water one 

 or two hundred feet, or where you are short on Avater and need to util- 

 ize every drop of it. It isn't practicable for a large orchard, and I 

 do not recommend it in any case where the water is under two liun- 

 dred feet. A very small amount of water will go a long ways if you 

 handle it right. 



Question — Is any one using subirrigation in your country? 



Mr. Fort — They are using subirrigation all up along the valley 

 of the Lodge Pole. They throw dikes across the Lodge Pole creek, 

 along which the soil is gravelly, and the water pushes out on either 

 side. Tiiere is a Mr. George, who lives south of Brady Island, and 

 has a piece of land where the water is only four feet below the sur- 

 face. He had a splendid crop every year, and in 1894 he had about 

 sixty bushels of corn to the acre. This was by subirrigation; he 

 didn't have to irrigate by ditches or canals. 



Dr. Bessey — Mr. Fort, the inquiry lias been made here at Lincoln 

 and in this county whether it is possible to take water out of these 

 streams successfully for irrigating purposes. We have a rather roll- 

 ing country and our streams are rather low. 



Mr. Fort — In this section of the state canals would never be 

 practicable, taking into consideration tlie large amount of annual rain- 

 fall and the fact that the water would have to be taken from the 

 streams by machinery; and some of these old-fiashioned machines that 

 have been \u use for three or four thousand years are just as good as 

 the new-fashioned ones that have been patented, and they cost a good 

 deal less. For instance, uj) at that Sidney convention, also at the 

 Omaha convention, there was a man with one of those old Archimedes 

 screws. He had gotten up what he called an invention for drilling 

 wells with a screw for lifting the water, and he could lift more water 

 with one of these screws for the amount of power applied than any- 

 thing 1 have seen yet. And in the matter of pumps, the old-lashioned 

 ship bilge pump is a good one. Mr. Coddington, of Kearney, lias 

 made a pump of that kind, though he hasn't any patent on it. Tlie 

 centrifugal pump will lift more water, where you have the power, 

 than anything I know of. In Indiana last summer I saw one of those 

 six-inch pumps lift water enough in four hours to irrigate two acres of 

 land. 



The President — In this portion of the state we frequently liave 



