SPECIAL FARM TOPICS 265 



rights of the owners of lower lands over or through which drainage 

 must be obtained. Many misunderstandings in the adjustment of 

 these matters arise from a misconception of the true office and 

 results of land drainage in general. (F. B. 187.) 



Drainage of Irrigated Lands. Where the evil of over-irriga- 

 tion has been wrought, too much cannot be said in favor of a proper 

 system of under-drainage. Even though a given farm many not be 

 injured by alkali, seepage waters from this farm will arise upon 

 farms lower down, bringing with them alkali salts, which, if allowed 

 to accumulate, will ruin the land. Many of the western soils are 

 hardly considered valuable enough to w r arrant extensive drainage; 

 but drainage will have to be done sooner or later. (Y. B. 1898.) 



Irrigated lands needing drainage may be divided into three 

 classes: (1) Those injured by excess of water only; (2) those af- 

 fected by an excess of both water and alkali; and (3) those having 

 an excess of alkali only. The first class is the least extensive of the 

 three, the extent of injury depending upon the value of the crops 

 that may be grown on the land when dry. The greatest danger of 

 serious loss in this kind of land is that alkali may accumulate in in- 

 jurious quantities with the lapse of time. In the irrigated region 

 there is very little seepage water which does not contain some alkali 

 in solution, which tends to accumulate to an injurious degree in 

 saturated land. Inquiry into the history of lands which have be- 

 come badly affected with both alkali and water show that when in- 

 jury first became noticeable such lands could have been protected 

 from further injury with as much profit as attended the reclamation 

 of lands affected by water only. It is to the second class that most 

 of the lands belong which now need drainage in the irrigated sec- 

 tions. Alkali accumulations usually follow accumulations of seep- 

 age water. If one admits that this condition is a forerunner of total 

 abandonment, surely no argument is necessary to convince him that 

 such lands belong to the class that should be drained. Lands of the 

 third class are principally those in the virgin state, having enough 

 alkali uniformly distributed through the soil to a depth of 6 feet to 

 cause crop failure after a few years of irrigation, because of in- 

 sufficient underdrainage. If irrigated lightly, the alkali will in 

 time become concentrated at the surface, and if irrigated copiously, 

 without underdrainage, water-logging will follow. (F. B. 371.) 



Necessity of Drainage. Lands which up to a certain time have 

 produced crops in quantity and quality to which no exception can 

 be taken, may, without apparent cause, begin to deteriorate. Upon 

 examination it will be found that the alkali salts have accumulated 

 near the surface in such strength as to destroy crops that had pre- 

 viously been grown successfully. The need of drainage of such soils 

 as a preventive of such injuries, as well as for a restoration of the 

 land to its normal productive condition, is apparent. The subject 

 has a peculiar significance to the owners of lands which have suc- 

 cumbed to the inroads of seepage. In sections of the country where 

 irrigation is resorted to many a highly productive ranch has been 

 seriously injured or wholly ruined by seepage. By drainage such 



