IRRIGATION. 125 



away to a mera rill. It is fed by springs, and in these springs the trout survive, through 

 the heats of summer. This brook is dammed, near the spot where it enters the farm, with a 

 sligh bank of earth and stone. No effort has been made to accumulate water in a reservoir 

 against a dry time, though it could be done at small expense. Only a part of the natural flow 

 of the water has been turned out of its channel. 



The irrigating ditches, of which there are several taken from the main stream, are small 

 and narrow, and have a very slight fall. They could be made very rapidly with a plow and 

 ox-shovel. The forty acres put under water, slope gently to the south and east. The water 

 is taken out of these irrigating ditches in slight rills, and passed over the meadow. Any surplus 

 water falls into the ditch below, or is returned to the brook. The distance for which the 

 water is diverted from its natural channel is less than a quarter of mile. The water is kept 

 flowing summer and winter, and the winter flowage carries quite as much fertilizing matter 

 as that of summer, and perhaps more. The refuse vegetable matter gathered in the swamp 

 above, floating leaves, wash of roads and cultivated fields and brook channel, is carried down 

 to these meadows. 



The water is often discolored in heavy rains, and even that which seems to be pure car 

 ries more or less sediment with it. The liquid manure may be very thin, but the fact is well 

 established that wherever water runs over well-drained soil, grass springs up in greatest luxu 

 riance. The purest spring water makes grass wherever it flows. Summer and winter, while 

 Mr. Ayres sleeps, this brook is making money for him, as it did for his ancestors. The 

 only expense to him is the slight labor of keeping the ditches clear, and of regulating the 

 flow of the water. The soil is a gravelly loam, and slopes so much that there is no chance 

 for stagnant water. In the opinion of Mr. Ayres the crop of hay is nearly doubled by the 

 irrigation alone.&quot; 



The advantages of this system of irrigation are summed up as follows : 



&quot; Besides the large increase of the grass crop, all these forty acres of meadow can be kept 

 perpetually in grass, which is probably the most profitable crop upon Connecticut farms. 

 There need be no more plowing, no more tillage-crops. The turf may thicken from genera 

 tion to generation, and produce that best of all forage, a thick, fine hay made from a mixture 

 of grasses growing upon an old sod. Then top-dressing, when applied to increase the year s 

 crop, can be used to the best advantage. The manure is carried down immediately to the 

 roots of grasses, by the large supply of water upon the surface. There is no loss from evap 

 oration. The soil is kept to the production of nearly two tons of hay to the acre, without 

 top-dressing. 



Upon this the calculation is based of the value of irrigation upon this farm. We 

 suppose the natural production of the land to be not over a ton to the acre. A ton to the 

 acre then would be a fair estimate of the hay made by the irrigation. Hay sells in the 

 neighboring city markets at from $15 to $20 a ton, according to season and quality. If we 

 call the hay $10 a ton standing, it would give $400, as the annual dividend declared by the 

 brook. The investment is about as secure as government bonds, which pay four per cent, 

 nearly; the income is about the same as $10,000 in United States stocks. Not every farm 

 has the facilities of this for irrigation, but some could irrigate on a much larger scale. 

 Almost every farm that has a brook running through it, or upon its borders, could have 

 some portion of its acres subject to irrigation.&quot; 



The growth of large forests may also be promoted by irrigation. Damont states in 

 Des Travaux Publics, that in order to hasten the growth of wood on the flanks of a mountain, 

 M. Eugene Chevandier divided the slope into zones forty or fifty feet wide, by horizontal 

 ditches closed at both ends, and thereby obtained from firs of different ages, shoots double 

 the dimensions of those which grew on a dry soil of the same character, where the water 

 was allowed to run off without obstruction. 



