160 THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



water, but wet as milk is it contains more dry matter than an equal 

 weight of plums, gooseberries or turnips. And there is this differ- 

 ence between milk and fruits: the more water milk has in it the poorer 

 the milk is; the more water you can get into fruits the better they are. 

 Nobody wants a dry apple, for instance, however fond they may be of 

 dried apples. Some people have turned up the nose at the Ben Davis 

 even on the ground that it was dry and punky. The more water you 

 can get into fruit the better color it will have, while the more you put 

 into milk the worse it will appear. With fruits the first point of ex- 

 cellence is juiciness that is you want your fruit gorged with water. 

 We say of such fruits, they melt in your mouth. In fact no fruit but 

 watery, juicy fruit makes your mouth >vater. Then again there is no 

 draft on the fertility of the soil for the water that goes into your ber- 

 ries. For instance, a crate of fine, large, juicy strawberries does not 

 take as much "strength," as we gardeners say, out of the soil, as a 

 crate of strawberries that are all skin and bones. It is mainly the 

 skin and seeds of berries that cost. That is where the nitrogen, the 

 phosphoric acid and potash are stored. And then consider the effect 

 of the two on the market; seedy berries soon satisfy demand; big 

 juicy berries create demand. Little nurly, prongy, ornery potatoes 

 stop people from eating potatoes. Nothing hurts the peach market 

 like cull peaches. When it comes to potatoes, it would seem at first 

 thought that the rule as to water would fall down; but it don't. The 

 driest potato comes from the irrigated districts; and yet one of those 

 Utah Rurals for all it cooks so mealy will have in it as much more 

 water than one of our Kansas potatoes as it is bigger than our speci- 

 men. Potatoes have the faculty of discrimination; they will take up 

 the right proportions of everything to make 'em taste good but salt, 

 that has to be added. 



Irrigation does much more than supply the needed moisture to 

 plants. It fertilizes them as well. Take it one year with another it 

 beats commercial fertilizers. It doesn't take the place of barn-yard 

 manure because it does nothing to supply fiber and humus to the soil. 

 The essential elements of" fertility, potash, phosphoric acid and nitro- 

 gen are now locked up in the soil in such abundance that the only con- 

 cern the cultivator need to feel is how to unlock them. These ele- 

 ments are unlocked by moisture, heat and cultivation. Our summer 

 season furnishes plenty of heat, we can supply the cultivation; if the 

 one thing now lacking, moisture, be sufficiently furnished, the fertiliz- 

 er man will place no mortages on our fields for generations to come. 

 A farmer's dearest enemy is the agent, the tree agent, the book agent, 

 the lightening rod agent, the insurance agent, the creamery construc- 

 tion agent, and the agent for chemical manures. I have observed that 

 the farmer seems to cope with the agent fairly well till the latter be- 

 gins to figure. As soon as he draws his note book and pencil the farm- 



