THE IEEIGATION AGE. 



51 



This system would never do, however, in a moist 

 soil. In such a case the soil should be carefully plowed 

 shallow and harrowed and the seed drilled in, about a 

 bushel to the acre. If the ground is surface dry it 

 should be flooded, say two inches, then in twenty-four 

 hours harrow and drill in the seed. Do not roll land 

 where irrigation is practiced, because it is liable to 

 cake, and this means evaporation. When the grains 

 are up two or three inches it is good to run a light 

 harrow over the field. It loosens the soil and does not 

 harm the grain, even if it does pull up a few plants ; 

 there is always too much sown, anyway. Twenty to 

 thirty days apart will be enough irrigation the first 

 one when the grain is five or six inches high, say two 

 inches, and a month after that one inch. In hot 

 climates it is beneficial to give a third irrigation when 

 the grain is heading or when it is in the milk. The 

 condition of the soil, as well as that of the plant, must 

 be considered and the quantity of water gauged ac- 

 cording to that. Digging down six inches will tell 

 the condition as to moisture, and breaking off a stalk 

 or two tell the condition of the plant. If "well" the 

 stalk will be juicy and damp to the touch. If dry, 

 yellowish, and breaks easily, give it water as soon as 

 possible. 



The Chinese and the Japanese plant their grain 

 in ridges about twenty inches apart and use only about 

 ten pounds per acre. But an acre will produce more, 

 at least just as much, as when drilled or sown broadcast. 

 One grain of wheat will "stool" out into sixty, and 

 sometimes eighty, healthy stalks in this way. There 

 are some small farmers who plant wheat along the 

 borders of their vegetable and small fruit beds and give 

 it careful cultivation. If planted farther apart, so as 

 to admit of the passage of a cultivator between the 

 rows and cultivated like corn, the result is most aston- 

 ishing. The fact is that when a bushel of wheat can 

 be grown in as small a space as a bushel of corn or 

 potatoes there is no reason why wheat should not be 

 grown in that manner, at least on small farms. One 

 thing to be considered where wheat is concerned is 

 that an excess of water spoils the food value of the 

 grain. For feeding or forage purposes it does not make 

 so much difference, as water in abundance increases 

 the nutritive elements in the husk. 



BARLEY. 



Barley is the standard crop for forage, or "hay," 

 in the arid and semi-arid regions. It will grow on 

 almost any kind of soil, and being a deep-rooted plant 

 it does not depend so much on irrigation as wheat. It 

 will grow a good stalk and form a good head for hay 

 with six inches of rainfall and produce good, market- 

 able grain with ten inches and no irrigation. 



The soil should be plowed deep and well pulver- 

 ized, then drilled in either in the fall or spring, or 

 sown broadcast. To raise it to perfection, and it re- 

 pays the labor of doing so, it should be given water 

 when about four inches high and another irrigation 

 when the heads are in the milk. It is a very profitable 

 crop to raise for brewing purposes, the demand for 

 malting barley being constant and increasing. More- 

 over, the price is much better than that for wheat. It 

 will grow two miles above the sea level and flourish 

 in alkali soil that will kill a sugar beet. 



OATS. 



Oats, fall or spring planted, require plenty of 

 water and attention, or they will refu^ to grow. There 



is one exception, however, and that is the case of the 

 "oat hills" in southern California, where a crop of 

 fine oats springs up spontaneously every spring. The 

 stalks grow as high as a man's head, with well rounded 

 heads, juicy and succulent. Just before the fall rains 

 the ground is cleared of the old stalks, a treetop or a 

 harrow dragged over it roughly, and then left to itself ; 

 the grain comes up in about three days after the first 

 rain of the season and does not require any irrigation 

 at all. The origin of this singular exception to the 

 rules relating to oats is in the old padres of the mis- 

 sions, who, when traveling about on their ponies for 

 many hundreds of miles, always carried a bag of grain 

 at their saddlebow, and when they came to a spot that 



MR. WM. HALE THOMPSON, 

 Member Executive Committee for Illinois, National Irrigation Congress. 



looked fertile they scattered the seed with a blessing 

 that it might grow. For over a hundred years this 

 grain grew and there was no man to harvest it, so it 

 ripened and returned back into the soil whence it 

 came, and now, to this day, it keeps on sprouting and 

 never ceasing, the soil below being dry and the seeit 

 sprouting when the moisture reaches it. 



However, many farmers irrigate oats frequently 

 under the supposition that they need, more water than 

 any other cereal, and the proof of it is that the crop is 

 enormous when well irrigated. -i-\' 



RYE. 



This is a hardy annual that will grow to full ma- 

 turity and give a good harvest with very little care and 

 irrigation. A medium irrigation when about half 

 grown and another when heading is sufficient. Culti- 

 vation, however, should be deep and the soil well pul- 

 verized. 



