EDITORIAL. 635 



have been made has been to show how irrational and ill advised sonic 

 of the practices are, and how diametrically opposed to the common 

 good and the fullest development of the country with the water supply 

 in sight. 



Hence, the strictly agricultural phases of irrigation, those with 

 which the farmer has to deal after the main canals have been built 

 and the water delivered at his boundaries, present a broad held for 

 investigation, surpassed in importance by no other branch of agricul- 

 tural inquiry and opening up great possibilities for usefulness. To 

 this tield the Department of Agriculture has addressed itself in the con- 

 duet of its irrigation investigations. It neither determines the water 

 supply available for irrigation and other purposes nor constructs or 

 operates irrigation work for reclaiming new areas. It directs its 

 efforts primarily to studies on the utilization of water in agriculture, 

 whether under private or public auspices, in order to determine how 

 to make the most of the limited water supply available for irrigation, 

 b} r using it to the best advantage in the production of crops. Closely 

 related to these questions are problems growing out of the misuse of 

 water, studies of the laws and institutions relating to irrigation, and 

 the development of irrigation in the semiarid and humid regions. 



The extent and character of the Department's irrigation work are 

 shown by the recently issued report for the past year by Dr. Elwood 

 Mead, the expert in charge. During the year studies were carried on 

 in thirty States and Territories, and in the Hawaiian Islands and Porto 

 Rico. This work was almost entirely in cooperation with the agricul- 

 tural experiment stations, State engineers and other agencies, which 

 fact helped to direct it along lines in which its aid was most urgently 

 needed and to give wide publicity to the results of the studies. 



Doctor Mead's report calls special attention to the increasing cost of 

 water, which the farmer must have whether the cost is great or small. 

 During the past five years this cost has risen enormously in nearly 

 every western State. Certain water rights in Colorado, for example, 

 which were originally purchased for $5 an acre, now sell for $35. 

 Where formerly 50 cents an acre-foot for water would have been 

 regarded as a prohibitive price, farmers last year paid $7 an acre-foot. 

 Fully $20,000,000 was paid by irrigators last year for the water they 

 used. In many cases, from lack of knowledge how to use the water 

 economically, they wasted and misapplied enormous quantities, thereby 

 injuring their crops and their land, and incidentally that of their neigh- 

 bors through seepage. 



During the investigations of the past few years matvy instances of 

 overirrigation have come under observation, showing that the farmers 

 were lacking in knowledge of the real needs of their crops and of the 



20085— No. 7—05 2 



