IRRIGATION OP MEADOWS. 95 



The effect of irrigation is sometimes found to render 

 both vines and trees subjected to it, very susceptible to the 

 frosts and severe weather of winter. This disadvantage 

 seems to be a necessary adjunct, or set-off, to the advan 

 tages gained by the practice. Thus, a severe winter has 

 been known to destroy whole groves of olive trees that 

 have been irrigated, while scattered trees, not so cultivat 

 ed, have escaped. It is rare that we can altogether 

 escape a combination of circumstances that seem to offer 

 us only a choice of evils ; an alternative, either side of 

 which is about as disagreeable as the other ; a Scylla and 

 Charybdis, neither of which can easily be escaped ; and 

 this business of irrigation of fruit trees seems especially 

 to be one in which the operator is obliged to exercise the 

 greatest care and circumspection to avoid, on the one 

 hand, the evils of excess, and on the other hand, the 

 periodical and certain dangers which this practice enables 

 him to obviate or mitigate when intelligently applied. 



^ LIB a A 



CHAPTER 



THE IRRIGATION OF IMEADGWSJ T LV \ I &amp;gt; V* I i 



-\ I.JIJF UKjNlA 



The permanent meadow is a very unusual adjunct to 

 an American farm. Our climate is not naturally well 

 adapted to the continued growth of grass. Our hot, dry 

 summers are unfavorable. Generally it may be stated as 

 beyond question, that the yield of grass is proportionate 

 to the supply of water. As has been previously stated, 

 no solid nutriment reaches any plant except as supplied 

 to it in solution in water. What are the ultimate possibil 

 ities of growth in any crop is unknown to us, but it 

 would seem as though they depended greatly upon the 

 supply of water that can be absorbed, sufficient nutriment 



