10 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



bad irrigation is to no irrigation. But not 

 always. If the best work costs too much 

 and the market is unsteady there may be 

 too much risk in this. YOTI may be able 

 to do one kind of work yourself but with 

 another may have to hire help or buy ma- 

 terial. And if you are working the ground 

 merely for your own convenience and care 

 little for looks bad work may be good 

 enough. Suppose you have a bed of 

 onions for your own use. If any way of 

 injuring them materially by bad wetting 

 can be devised I have not 'yet been able to 

 discover it. By good work you might get 

 a better crop and if you were, raising them 

 to sell it would doubtless pay you to do 

 better work. But you can not much affect 

 the quality of the onion by any style of 

 applying water and with any reasonable 

 amount of it you will have from a small 

 piece of ground more onions than you can 

 use. Out of pure curiosity I have made 

 desperate efforts to damage the radish 

 with bad irrigation; but as long as it gets 

 enough water the quality is hard to injure 

 and the yield from a small bit of ground 

 will be large enough, if the weather is 

 right. It is much the same with beets, 

 cabbage, carrots and all tough vegetables. 

 But if you" are raising stuff to sell and 

 have a sure market the very best work 

 will generally pay and for all high grade 

 products is quite certain to. 



The rainfall and its distribution as well 

 as the kind of weather that generally fol- 

 lows rain will also have an important in- 

 fluence upon your choice of a system. In 

 much of Southern California, the ground 

 holds moisture well and the rainfall aver- 

 ages about eighteen inches with a mini- 

 mum of about seven happening only at 

 very long intervals. Good crops of grain on 

 a rainfall of only twelve inches, some of 

 which by coming too early is practically 

 lost, are a common sight in short years. 

 And with good summer following fair 

 crops are raised on the very minimum of 

 seven inches. Thirty bushels of corn on 

 upland on which not a drop of rain has 

 fallen since the seed was planted are com- 

 mon on well plowed and cultivated uplands 

 in average seasons without a particle of 

 irrigation. And where the ground is well 

 cultivated good yields of fruit are com- 

 mon even in the average years if the trees 

 are not too old or too heavily loaded. The 

 dry period is generally more than six 



months but with good cultivation the 

 moisture retained in the ground from the 

 winter rains carries most things through 

 quite well. I am fully aware of how 

 monstrous these statements will appear to 

 many, but the truth can be had from 

 hundreds of places, and not for one year, 

 but for over a dozen. 



Under such conditions vegetation may 

 need but a little drinking water and any 

 way of supplying it may be good enough 

 for the purpose in hand. The soil may be 

 nearly moist enough to enable the roots to 

 feed and may need but a trifle more. Such 

 is the case in the greater part of the State& 

 east of the ^Mississippi where irrigation 

 will certainly oe used before many years 

 to carry many products over the periods 

 when the rainfall is too short and where it 

 would pay them to do it now if they only 

 knew it. But it would be folly to put in 

 the expensive systems necessary in those 

 sections where the rainfall is of little or 

 no use, and where the air is so much hot- 

 ter and drier that vegetation demands 

 more water to evaporate through the 

 leaves. And it might be equally unwise 

 to do the fine work that for high grade 

 products pays so well in California. The 

 only trouble is that from fair results from 

 careless work too many conclude that it is 

 good enough anywhere. 



GKADE THE LAND. 



In whatever way you apply the water it 

 will pay you to have the land so graded to 

 a uniform slope that the water will run in 

 all directions at about the same velocity. 

 This will be true if you are to run it only 

 from one small basin to another, still truer 

 if you are to run it in large heads from 

 check to check, and still more important 

 if you are to run it in a large number of 

 small streams across the tract. You will 

 get back all it costs in time and patience 

 to say nothing of the greater uniformity 

 of the wetting, and the greater ease of 

 cultivation and consequent better" results. 

 It is almost impossible to make people re- 

 alize this until there has been considerable 

 loss, and often not until the place is plant- 

 ed in an orchard that is paying just a little 

 too well to take out, where the trees are 

 too old to allow good grading between, 

 and yet in yield are steadily falling behind 

 a well-graded orchard beside it. No mat- 

 ter how even or level land may appear it 



