KANSAS ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 83 



experience and careful observation, have been determined. As to the re- 

 quired quantity of water, the rule is, one litre of continuous water per second 

 for every hectare: that is, fifty cubic feet of water per hour for one acre of 

 ground, taking the season of irrigation through. The Garden City ditch, 

 then, with a capacity of 153,420 feet per hour, will, by the French rule, irri- 

 gate 3,068 acres, or about one-half the area of ground within the reach of 

 the ditch. But this ditch can be easily increased to a size necessary to meet 

 any demand that may be made upon it. 



The Garden City experiment has naturally enough excited the interest of 

 the people generally in the section of the upper Arkansas valley, and other 

 canals are already projected. One other has been begun, and will be ready 

 to supply water for irrigation early next spring. This is also by a chartered 

 organization called the "Kansas Irrigating, Water Power and Manufactur- 

 ing Company." Of this company, Mr. C. J. Jones, of Garden City, was the 

 originator and is the active manager, as he has also been most active in 

 attracting public attention to this practical development of irrigation in 

 Kansas. The canal of this company commences at the west line of Sequoyah 

 county, twelve miles west of Garden City. Its length is about twenty miles. 

 It is already opened for fifteen miles — that is, it is so far made that water 

 has been run through it for that distance. It is to be twenty-two feet wide, 

 and will run four feet of water in depth. The cost of making it is to be not 

 to exceed $250 per mile. Not a cut or a fill is required for the entire dis- 

 tance of twenty miles. The ditching is done by machinery — that is, by 

 plowing and grading machines constructed for railroad grading and canal 

 excavation. This canal was carefully located by a civil engineer. It has a 

 fall of three feet to the mile. It runs clear out on the upland. It is by no 

 means a straight canal ; it has many curves, in order to keep the proper level, 

 or rather declivity ; but this winding and twisting will perhaps prove no 

 drawback as to its utility when in use. In commencing it, advantage was 

 taken of a time when the ground had been softened by rain for some inches, 

 and a grading plow was run the whole distance on both sides of the contem- 

 plated ditch, making two shallow ditches, some six feet wide, leaving a strip 

 within yet untouched. Water has been let into these shallow ditches, testing 

 the correctness of the engineering, and removing all possibility of difficult 

 excavation in the completion of the canal, by reason of dry and hard ground. 

 The earth yet to be excavated can now, at any time, be softened up by send- 

 ing a flow of water from the river through the shallow preliminary ditches. 

 As remarked by Mr. Jones, " the company has got the heels of this ditch." 

 As may well be supposed, the ground in that region is a little dry and hard 

 at times, especially on the uplands. 



The area estimated to be in reach of this canal is 38,000 acres. Applying 

 the French rule before mentioned, its actual capacity for irrigation is about 

 21,600 acres. It can be easily enlarged at any time. 



It is one of the most favorable circumstances connected with this irrigation 



