188 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



OLD ALAMEDA, NEAR LA VIRGINIA. 



conveying it to the rich lands of the plains, supplies the moisture for 

 plant growth that nature failed to provide, making it rich in products 

 for the maintenance of man. 



Irrigation, as now 

 practiced in general, is 

 on the same system 

 that it was 200 years 

 ago when the ditches 

 were first planned by 

 the Spanish and exca- 

 vated by the Indians. 

 But few dams have 

 ever been built to store 

 the surplus waters of 

 the rainy season or 

 those that run to waste 

 when not in use on the 

 growing crops, there- 

 fore the area cultivat- 

 ed now is just the capacity that the running streams will irrigate, 

 during the growing season, which no doubt could be increased two or 

 three fold by a series of dams and reservoirs and by paving the 

 ditches. The method used to take out water from the streams is 

 gravitation; the ditches running far enough up to tap the water at 

 the river bed. At present there are no high water assessments to 



pay, for whoever owns 



land under irrigation 

 owns water rights with 

 the land and the only 

 expense is cleaning and 

 keeping the ditches in 

 repair. The main can- 

 al is called toma, the 

 branches, acequris, 

 while the laterals for 

 irrigating are called 

 regaderos, and to irri- 

 gate is regar. Water 

 is measured by surcos 

 48 surcos make a 

 buey. A surco is a 

 flow of Qi litres per 

 second or equals 1.43 

 galons per second, or 

 85.8 gallon per minute 



ORANGE GROVE-FOUR YEAR OLD TANGERINE TREES. 



