208 



THE IRRIGATION AGE 



horticulturist make so little use of steam. 

 A small engine can be purchased for $150, 

 which will not only run his pumping ma- 

 chinery during irrigation, but in the win- 

 ter season can be used -for cutting and 

 grinding feed and innumerable other pur- 

 poses. With a No. 4 Rotary pump about 

 600,000 gallons of water per ton of coal 

 was raised by Professor King to a height 

 of 26 feet. If a ton of coal costs not more 

 than $2 this would be at a rate of .3 of a 

 cent per thousand gallons, or exactly the 

 cost to us at the Hospital. 



With reference to piping. In the West 

 wood pipes are much used. They are 

 made both by boring out solid logs of wood, 

 and by banding together staves. If these 

 pipes are well made, and thoroughly paini- 

 ed inside and out with a carbolized filler, 

 they will last a long time in the ground; 

 and the first cost is small, not exceeding 

 12 to 15 cents per foot for a six inch pipe. 

 The best pipe of course is the cast iron 

 pipe. Cast iron lasts much longer in the 

 soil than either wrought iron or steel. In 

 our work, we use the best grade of cast iron 

 pipe, laid entirely beiow the frost line, 

 using 3, 4, and 6 inch pipe." 



As to the method of applying the water 

 he continues: "In our work we used only 

 the ditch and flooding methods. In both 

 cases the water was conveyed in large 

 ditches meandering in conformity with the 

 contour of the ground, running ofttimes 

 by very circuitous routes to the points de-" 

 sired. There it was diverted into furrows 

 made by what is called a 'middle breaker.' 

 or double mold board plow, between the 

 rows of corn, potatoes and cabbage, or 

 whatever the crop; or by the flooding meth- 

 od it was spread out over a leveled space, 

 10 to 15 feet in width, with ridges 6 to 8 

 inches high thrown up to separate these 

 spaces from each other, and occasional 

 cross ridges if the descent of the ground 

 was too rapid. The slope of the land must 

 be constantly kept in mind, and it is best 

 always to begin at the lowest point and 

 work backwards. In irrigating our or- 

 chards, we run a furrow on each side of 



each row of trees and allow the water to 

 run slowly through this furrow. Two ir- 

 rigations are all that are needed in this 

 climate, one early in the spring and the 

 other just as the fruit begins to ripen 

 When the trees are small we run this fur- 

 row close, and farther and farther away as 

 the trees grow larger." 



Truck and horticulturing gardening were 

 in Dr. Grapin's opinion, the branches of 

 agriculture in which irrigation could be 

 most profitably used in the humid states, 

 and perfect drainage be considered as im- 

 portant a qualification to success as irri- 

 gation. 



The crop failure of 1893-'94, by which 

 the institution at Kankakee suffered a 

 great loss, led Dr. Gapin to try irrigation 

 in 1895. One hundred and fifty acres were 

 set aside for garden purposes to supply the 

 institution with vegetables and fruit, and 

 this entire tract was irrigated, ninety and 

 one-half acres being devoted to vegetables 

 alone, which yielded $6,478.40 or $71,57 

 per acre. The vegetables raised were: 

 Four acres of beets, 15 of cabbage, 3 of 

 cauliflower, three-quarters of an acre of 

 cucumbers, three-quarters of an acre of 

 lettuce, 7 acres of water-melon and musk 

 melon, 3 acres of onions, 5 acres of peas, 

 3 of radishes, 6 of tomatoes, 15 of turnips. 

 25 of potatoes, 2 and one-half of greens 

 and one-half acre of rhubarb. 



The cost of laying the pipe was about 

 $10 per acre. The land was newly broken 

 having never before been used for vege- 

 tables, and the irrigating was begun late, 

 two drawbacks to the fullest success of the 

 experiment; in spite of which it was a pay- 

 ing investment to the institution.. 



This will give some slight idea of what 

 may be accomplished by irrigation, even in 

 sections where the rainfall is plentiful. 



A south Dakota paper heads its 

 births, marriages and deaths, "Hatched" 

 "Matched" and "Dispatched. " The rec- 

 ords of the divorce courts would seem to 

 warrant another department headed "De- 

 tached." 



