230 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



depth so as to leave water to run into the 

 next check. For on this big scale laterals 

 cost money and it is strict economy to 

 make one check feed the next one for a 

 pretty long series. 



Checks thus made will last practically 

 forever, the alfalfa or grain preventing 

 their washing. They become in time as 

 hard as any canal bank, and the only 

 weak spot is the place where they are cut. 

 This is purposely left weak to avoid the 

 labor of cutting every time which is conr 

 siderable where they are of full strength. 



TURNING IN THE WATEK. 



When all is ready to turn in the water, 

 eight or ten men, armed with hoes, take 

 a line of checks, and a head of about thirty 

 cubic feet a second or 1,500 miner's inches 

 is turned into the upper one. If a large 

 one, there is considerable waiting to do, 

 but if a small one it is not long before it 

 is time to cut the lower bank to let the 

 water into the next one. In a small check 

 one cut is generally enough, but in a long 

 one, two or three, and even four cuts, may 

 be necessary to empty it fast enough. 

 These cuts are quite large and let a great 

 volume of water through. Ten men can 

 handle this head of water and irrigate 200 

 acres a day with it on an average. Gen- 

 erally seven can do it, unless there are a 

 great many small checks to fill and empty. 

 Where they are very large two or three 

 men can do it, and there are places where 

 one can do it. There a single man on the 

 line of bank between two checks of 200 

 acres each reminds one of the old hymn 

 " Lo, on a narrow neck of land, 

 'Twixt two unbounded seas I stand." 



I tried to get a picture of one of these, 

 but it is too large for a common camera to 

 bring out well. 



At the rate of one man a day to twenty 

 acres this is very cheap flooding, and it 

 can hardly be done on tile scale requisite 

 for good orchard work, to be followed by 

 cultivation. For the only safe way to do 

 that well is to make the checks small and 

 have the water shallow in them. For 

 handling these with a head of two cubic 

 feet to ten acres, two and generally three 

 men are necessary for very good work. A 

 piece of land so fiat that ten acres can be 

 managed by one man on a small scale is 

 not likely to be well enough drained to be 

 good orchard land. 



Sometimes enough water is at once let 



into the upper check to feed the whole line 

 of which that is the first, and sometimes 

 more water is allowed to run through it to 

 add to the first instalment. This depends 

 on what is in it and how it will stand the 

 run of water; old alfalfa standing a good 

 deal if there is no danger of scalding. 

 The whole is so arranged that any surplus 

 at the lower end has a waste ditch to 

 receive it. 



When these checks are emptied plenty 

 of wet spots remain, with water an inch or 

 two and often three or four inches deep. 

 These are depressions which it was not 

 thought worth while to fill by leveling off 

 the tract. Probably the results would not, 

 for low-grade crops, justify the expense 

 where land is so plenty and water so cheap. 

 But this will not do for the small farmer 

 to imitate, and the effects of it can be 

 quickly seen even in winter, when the sun 

 is not hot enough to scald the plants or to 

 bake the ground much. Of barley, wheat 

 and young alfalfa about one-third of the 

 stand is destroyed by a depression of about 

 two inches, and about two-thirds by three 

 or four inches. In some places where the 

 water had been so deep that it was impos- 

 sible to make an estimate, it was practi- 

 cally all destroyed. That is, if the whole 

 field were in that shape it would be too 

 thin to be worth cutting. Old alfalfa 

 seemed uninjured. There was no grain 

 old enough to show the effect on old grain, 

 but it would not have been as bad as with 

 the young grain, though anything but 

 good. In hot weather the effect would 

 have been much worse. It is due princi- 

 pally to the water standing too long and 

 deep. On account of the pressure it would 

 take the water that remained in the de- 

 pression much longer to soak away than if 

 that were all that had been put in there in 

 the first place. 



Smaller checks, and especially square or 

 rectangular ones, for lands lying like these 

 and bearing such crops, on so large a scale, 

 would merely increase the cost without 

 any corresponding advantage. The larger 

 they can be made the greater area a given 

 number of men can handle, and the only 

 limitation on the size is the depth of water 

 in them and the facilities for getting it 

 quickly in and out again when it has done 

 its work. 



There seems no doubt that all this work 

 is profitable. Miller and Lux are not 

 offering any land for sale, yet they are 



