GARDEN IRRIGATION 167 



g-et high enough to pull with the hand, but rake them 

 out as soon as they show their heads. 



In watering, the best results can be had by wetting 

 the ground well, then letting it alone until it needs 

 water again. Do not put a little on every day or so. 

 This rule will apply to almost all garden stuff except 

 tomatoes. A good plan with tomatoes is to keep them 

 growing nicely until the fruit is well set, then wet them 

 a great deal. 



Sold to the Miners. — A location not far from the 

 gold mines of Cripple Creek gave Philip H. Sheridan, 

 Colorado, a good market for the surplus produce of his 

 half-acre irrigated garden. Sales amounted to seventy- 

 two dollars and cost was fifty-two. He writes : 



The garden patch is adobe soil and contains a little 

 alkali. We depend on irrigation altogether to grow 

 our crops, but occasionally we have rains that help the 

 crops some. Each time I irrigate the garden I charge 

 one-half hour against it. The water is allowed to run 

 on the garden nearly all day, so there is very little to 

 do except to turn the water on and turn it off again 

 when it is wet enough. Wages here are one dollar 

 and fifty cents per day for men boarding themselves, 

 one dollar and tw^enty-five cents for women and three 

 dollars for team and man. I have from three to eight 

 boarders during the season, and we consume nearly 

 all the ])ro(luct, but any surplus we have brings a ready 

 sale at a good price. 



A Three-acre Irrigated Garden was managed with 

 considerable profit by J. H. Crowley, Rocky Ford, Colo- 

 rado. He used land one year from sod, valued at one 

 hundred dollars per acre. Ten large loads of sheep 

 manure and six barrels of hen manure were applied. 

 The poultry manure was first soaked in a pit and then 

 distributed by turning the irrigating ditch through the 



