134 IRRIGATION 'FARMING. 



to water land is when a cloud comes np and a shower is 

 expected. In nine cases out of ten the shower does not 

 give all the water needed, so the work will not be useless- 

 ly expended. Irrigation should not be done in the open 

 when the sun is shining hot, as there is great danger of 

 scalding the plants. If we have a good head of water in 

 the ditch we prefer to begin irrigating at four o'clock in 

 the afternoon, and often keep up the work as late as mid- 

 night, especially on moonlight nights. At the Utah sta- 

 tion the temperature of plats irrigated nights was slight- 

 ly higher than those irrigated days. The yield of grain 

 was slightly greater on the plat irrigated in the day time, 

 due probably to the checking of the growth of the foliage. 

 The total yield, or the yield of straw and grain, was some 

 fifteen per cent greater on the plats irrigated at night, 

 and the ratio of straw to wheat was therefore much 

 greater on the plat irrigated at night. Straw to bushel 

 of grain when irrigated nights, 120 pounds ; when irri- 

 gated days, eighty-nine pounds. 



The Flooding System. As already mentioned 

 the land must be prepared and made as near even as pos- 

 sible, by scraping down the knolls and filling up the low 

 places so that the water will spread evenly. If it does 

 not spread in this way the irrigator must follow it out 

 with his shovel and conduct it to the neglected spots. 

 The application of water to crops by 'the method of 

 flooding is the quickest and cheapest, and hence is almost 

 universally used for grass, meadows and grain crops. On 

 those soils which bake and crack badly flooding is injuri- 



unless the plants stand close enough together to 

 shade the ground well. Water coming directly against 

 tin- crown is unfavorable to the growth of many plants. 

 It has often been noticed that millet, rye, oats and other 

 crops will be larger and more thrifty a short distance 

 from a ditch bank, where they rcrriu- all their moist mv 

 by seepage, than they will farther out in the field, where 



