186 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



MONEY WASTED IN CANALS. 



One of the Western Kansas canals repre- 

 sents over a million dollars of wasted cap- 

 ital, which was invested with a lack of 

 knowledge regarding the hydrography of 

 the region. Failing in attempts to main- 

 tain a dam for the diversion of the floods 

 (into a canal having a capacity of only a 

 small per cent of the flood flow) its com- 

 pany built a long, easy diversion dike. 

 This failing, an attempt was made to tap 

 the underflow by an open channel extend- 

 ing up stream, with lighter grade than 

 Nature gave the river. Other companies 

 are even now following suit, and failure 

 awaits most of them. 



The development of underground water- 

 supplies is properly a problem of engineer- 

 ing, not of financiering nor politics, and 

 the man who attempts to develop the un- 

 derflow by guess would go to law without 

 a lawyer, and he must expect to be fined 

 for contempt in Nature's court. Probably 

 two thousand individuals in Western Kan- 

 sas have erected pumping plants of various 

 styles and capacities within a few years 

 past. So far as known the rate of progress 

 is illustrated by the following comparison 

 of the number of plants erected: 1891, 18; 

 1892, 33; 1893,55; 1894,224; 1895, 1,241. 

 The State Board of Irrigation reports that 

 six of these men pronounce pump irriga- 

 tion a failure. Is this strange ? Irrigation 

 is a new feature of agriculture on the 

 plains. It has taken the writer over two 

 years of investigation and study to get even 

 a fair idea as to water duty on the plains, 

 the cost and methods of underflow devel- 

 opment, the relative cost of pumping by 

 various powers and other kindred prob- 

 lems, all of which concern every irrigator, 

 be his farm large or small. It is wonder- 

 ful, then, if only a fraction of one per cent 

 of the farmers who have attempted pump 

 irrigation have made mistakes sufficient to 

 cause them to pronounce it a failure. 



COMMON ERRORS. 



It is so easy for a man to put in a pump 

 for raising two thousand gallons a minute 

 from a well that can only supply five hun- 

 dred gallons a minute, and whose capacity 

 could have been told before erecting the 

 pump; so easy for a man to assume that with 

 an average annual rainfall of twenty inches 

 he will need but a very little water, forget- 

 ing or not knowing that it is the minimum 

 of two inches in the first six months of the 



year, or the minimum of five inches per 

 annum, upon which his needs should be 

 based; so easy for him to find in manufac- 

 turer's catalogues the indicated and actual 

 H. P., and so think he has made all neces- 

 sary allowance for friction when he buys 

 the necessary "A. H. P." computed from 

 the water lift; so easy for him to base his 

 windmill computations on a fifteen-mile 

 wind given in catalogues, when the aver- 

 age is but eleven, to forget the law of 

 squares and to forget that the wind blows 

 lightest when he needs the most water. 



A FEW INSTANCES. 



Let us now look at a few fair represent- 

 ative cases of what is being done in one 

 season in a section of country that has 

 been nearly depopulated on account of 

 insufficient rainfall to produce crops. 



Eugene Tilleux, Tribune, Greeley Co., Kan- 

 sas, uses an eight-foot mill; well 130 feet deep to 

 water. Planted one acre of garden vegetables; 

 three-quarters of the area was a total loss. Mill 

 was only good for a quarter acre, and furnished 

 not over six inches in depth of water during 

 the season to that quarter. Besides all vegeta- 

 bles needed for family use, received from sale 

 of surplus ninety dollars, which paid for the 

 pumping outfit. 



1. L. Diesem, Garden City,Finney Co.,Kansas. 

 Fourteen-foot mill; seventeen feet to water. 

 Cost of plant, including reservoir, $200. Irri- 

 gates twelve acres. Two acres sweet potatoes, 

 303 bushels; four-tenths acre onions, 400 bush- 

 els; half acre sugar-beets, 128 bushels, etc. 

 " Have made a living this year and paid off a 

 three hundred dollar mortgage." 



J. M. Cramblett, Kinsley, Edwards Co., Kan- 

 sas. Twenty- eight feet to water. Irrigates one- 

 half acre with small windmill. Yield : 160 

 bushels of tomatoes, sold for $40; four tons of 

 cabbage, sold for $160. Cabbage yielded at the 

 rate of $640 per acre. -Onions and other vege- 

 tables for family use not measured. 



V. Q. Billings, Kinsley, Edwards Co., Kan- 

 sas. Twelve-foot mill; cost of plant $150. Put 

 in too late; could not irrigate till June, when 

 crop had begun to suffer. Had several mishaps 

 with mill and reservoir, but still sold from one 

 and a quarter acres, potatoes, $300; cabbage, 

 $100, besides family supply. 



N. O. Waymire, Garfield-on-the-Arkansas, 

 Pawnee Co., Kansas. Reservoir is filled with 

 an eight-foot steel mill located over 200 feet 

 away. Cylinder is a 4x12 brass-lined Morris 

 Perfection with 1% inch stroke. Sheet water is 

 found at a depth of ten feet, and is drawn 

 through a two-inch sand point. Pump is hand- 

 made, of two-inch pipe, with large air chamber 

 and stuffing box. Conducting pipe is 1^ inch 

 laid on the ground, and goes over the embank- 

 ment with 45 elbows, forming a siphon. This 

 makes the lift thirteen to 18 feet, according to 

 amount of water in reservoir. Ground irri- 

 gated in 1895, with reservoir shown, was one 

 acre subsoiled, and )^ acre not subsoiled. 



