THE ART OF IRRIGATION. 



15 



what to the contour of the land. But there 

 has been no such systematic laying out of 

 the land as I have described. Many of the 

 checks are not over five acres, running up 

 to twenty and even forty acres, while on 

 the ten and five acre tracts they run down 

 to a quarter of an acre or even half of 

 that. Most of them are made with the 

 plow and scraper and on some quite level 

 ground they are apparently made with the 

 plow alone. Fifteen and eighteen inches 

 are about the maximum heights, with 

 many not over a foot. All are made 

 broad at the bottom and almost all are 

 permanent and can be driven over with 

 machinery of any kind. 



Gates from one check to another are 

 here very rare and the main reliance is on 

 cutting the check. But in many cases 

 they do not feed one another and the 

 checks are arranged in lines along laterals. 

 In many cases the only waste ditches are 

 natural depressions which retain much of 

 the water to the joy of the mosquito. The 

 average depth of water in the checks is 

 less than is too often used in Kern county, 

 and seldom exceeds six inches. The land 

 here is extremely rich for many leagues 

 and prosperous farms of alfalfa and gen- 

 eral crops, with fruit farms of all decidu- 

 ous fruits are about one. The never- 

 failing and beautiful Kaweah pours every 

 year, across the land, a bountiful supply 

 of water and what was once a vast park of 

 immense oaks is now in long lines of 

 farms, with only a little park of the an- 

 cient oaks about the house or out in the 

 pasture, to shade the thousands of cattle 

 from the heat of a summer's noon. It is 

 a lovely land to look upon, but here too 

 the fatal gift of plenty of water has 

 wrought ruin on many an acre of the deep 

 rich mould of the old park and undone 

 many a two-legged hog who thought he 

 was getting ahead of his neighbors or 

 cheating the water company. 



ALKALI. 



Thousands of acres are now useless from 

 alkali on the surface, where it is evident 

 from the surroundings and the character 

 of the subsoil in adjoining cuts that there 

 was no excuse for it. Most all of it can 

 be reclaimed for there is plenty of drain- 

 age, but even such temporary ruin is 

 shameful. It is but a few feet to good 

 sheet water under the greater part of the 

 land, with no hard pan of consequence be- 



low the top soil. There is only a sheet of 

 finer material over the greater part of it 

 two or three feet below the top. With 

 water so near the surface and the rainfall 

 much greater than in Kern county there is 

 no need of using any more water than is 

 used south of the Tehachipi mountains 

 where the finest work of the world is done. 



On the greater part, furrows could be 

 used as well as elsewhere, and the water 

 now in the ditches could do twice or 

 thrice the work it now performs. Yet 

 everywhere you see where fields have been 

 turned into swamps by allowing the water 

 to run long after it should have been shut 

 off, orchards with the top soil condensed to 

 a cement by too deep, as well as too long 

 standing water, others where the waste 

 has been allowed to stand in the last checks 

 because there was no waste ditch or be- 

 cause it was clogged up and the owner 

 was too lazy to clean it, still others where 

 the soil looks as if it was wet every week 

 and never had a chance to dry. As I re- 

 marked about the other place, I don't like 

 to say there is no attempt at good cultiva- 

 tion, therefore I won't. 



But in spite of all this there are so many 

 places that show unmistakable success in 

 making, not only a living but also some 

 money that, in spite of the gross waste of 

 grand opportunities this settlement must 

 be considered a great triumph of irriga- 

 tion. There is no place in the lands de- 

 pending on the rainfall direct that can 

 show any such wealth to so few acres and 

 certainly none that can show so many 

 farmers out of debt and with a comfort- 

 able balance in bank. There are unmis- 

 takable signs of prosperity, in spite of the 

 hard times,that he who runs may read, and 

 nowhere are they more positively written 

 all over a section than over a great major- 

 ity of the alfalfa fields and orchards here. 

 On the alfalfa farms and especially those 

 mixed with a little fruit and vegetables, 

 with corn and pumpkins, Egyptian corn 

 and some other things, you can see at a 

 glance that certain living that once made 

 the American farmer the most independent 

 of mortals, as he was then called, and the 

 neglect of which has reduced too many to 

 the most dependent. In the fat cattle and 

 the baled hay, in the corn in the bin, in 

 the hens cackling around the straw stack, 

 and the turkeys strutting about the road, 

 you see a surplus for pin money, while the 

 big udders on the cows and the great 



