156 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



plowing and cultivation, it is not easy to 

 say that the difference would have paid. 



There is little land anywhere that will 

 justify such large checks. This was the 

 most level land I have ever seen, and was 

 probably once the bed of a lake fed by 

 the River Nazas. The water was prac- 

 tically of uniform depth throughout and 

 took over two days to spread thoroughly 

 over it. There were dry places all through 

 it, but so very low and small that they 

 amounted to nothing. They came, no 

 doubt, from uneven plowing, but the water 

 soaked through them fast enough. 



On the other hand, the smallest checks 

 I have ever seen used for field crops were 

 in Mexico on a large hacienda cear Jim- 

 enez. Several thousand acres were planted 

 in wheat, and' the whole was in checks 

 about ten feet square. I was over it sev- 

 eral times in January and the stand of 

 wheat was very good and it no doubt made 

 a fair crop. The land was black adobe. 

 The checks were made with the common 

 wooden plow of the country a bit of log 

 six or eight inches in diameter sharpened 

 at the end. They had in places been 

 patched up with a hoe, but the whole work 

 was quite well done. It could pay only 

 with very cheap labor like the peon labor 

 of Mexico. The checks were undoubtedly 

 so small on account of the slope, which 

 did not appear great on account of big 

 mountains in front, but which must have 

 been considerable to require so much 

 labor. 



METHODS OF THE CHINESE. 



For lettuce, radishes and other vegeta- 

 bles to be grown very early, the Chinese 

 market gardeners often use checks even 

 smaller than ten feet, and even on level 

 ground. They seem unable to tell the rea- 

 son, but it no doubt is because they can in 

 that way run a thin sheet of water over 

 the whole, get it in the ground more 

 evenly and in less time per square foot 

 than could be done with larger checks. In 

 this way there is no such chilling of the 



ground or puddling in places as if more 

 water were turned into larger checks. By 

 taking care in this way they raise good 

 vegetables in fair quantity without any 

 cultivation, even very tender ones suffer- 

 ing little if any. 



But when it comes to later crops and 

 things to be grown on a larger scale, the 

 Chinaman finds this small checking too 

 slow. He then makes them of many sizes 

 and shapes. For tough stuff like cabbage 

 he will sometimes make them half or even 

 the whole length of the field, and from 

 twenty to a hundred feet wide. He pre- 

 fers furrows for almost everything where 

 they can be used, but when they will not 

 work to advantage he does not hesitate to 

 flood. But he tries always to rush the 

 thinnest sheet over the ground in the 

 shortest time, unless the nature of the 

 crop makes it unprofitable to spend too 

 much work on it. He is a good irrigator 

 and no one can afford to ignore his work. 

 It is worth studying for the principles in- 

 volved, and cheap as his labor is, he is 

 still a close figurer in economizing work. 



For alfalfa and other field crops where 

 the land is flat enough and the head of 

 water large enough, forty acres make 

 about as large a check as is generally con- 

 sistent with economy. In the San Joaquin 

 valley of California, probably the great- 

 est alfalfa region in the world, many are 

 larger than that. Many are also smaller, 

 and it is difficult to see any advantage for 

 ordinary farms in having them over ten 

 acres for anything. While it is well to 

 imitate the methods of prosperous settle- 

 ments, you must still remember that the 

 secret of success in flooding is to get the 

 water in the ground as rapidly as possible 

 and in as even sheets as possible, avoiding 

 all puddling and scalding, which will re- 

 sult if the water is allowed to stand any- 

 where too long. Other things being equal 

 the smaller the checks the more easy it 

 will be to do this. 



(To be Continued.) 



