40 CALIFORNIA VEGETABLES 



And from this low-water mark the unirrigated garden pro- 

 ceeds upward with richer endowment of favoring local conditions, 

 insuring length of growing season and variety of vegetables until 

 it really becomes a question whether irrigation is needed at all. It 

 certainly is not for ample yield of many, possibly all, of the staples 

 of the garden, but to insure a succession of salads and relishes, pot- 

 herbs and legumes in short, to enjoy the fullness of the California 

 season, the irrigated garden, we say again, and for the last time, 

 we hope, is the thing to be diligently striven for. 



SOURCES OF IRRIGATION WATER. 



Whence the garden shall receive its water supply is a question 

 for each to determine according to his environment. Water is now 

 flowing over California gardens from various sources as the result 

 of all sorts of individual, co-operative and corporate efforts and in- 

 vestments. It would require volumes to describe them. Large irri- 

 gation enterprises are the joint work of engineers and capitalists. 

 That gardener is fortunate who has only to buy his water from a 

 fair-dealing ditch company or draw his share from a co-operative 

 water company in which he has an interest. Such a source is best 

 of all because causing least labor and expense in average cases. 

 Wherever the landowner can promote honestly and economically 

 managed irrigation enterprises for community use he should do it 

 without an exhortation. But to whatever extent this work is car- 

 ried there will always remain opportunities, probably, where farm 

 gardens can command their own irrigation supplies at a cost which 

 will warrant the effort. It is in this line that a few suggestions will 

 be offered. 



Surface Sources. In the unirrigated regions of the state there 

 are countless opportunities for home supplies of irrigation water by 

 the simple process of allowing it to run down hill your way instead 

 of that way which is natural to it. Water which would be of great 

 value in the house and barn and farm-garden is allowed to flow by 

 in its own deep channel when a very little use of the level would 

 show that a part of it could be taken out into a ditch or pipe, higher 

 up its course through the farm, and brought along with less fall 

 than it naturally takes, until it reaches the buildings high up the 

 slope above the bank instead of in the deep bed it has cut in the 

 soil below. This is very simple and inexpensive, and yet we have 

 many hillside places in the central and northern parts of the state 

 where the water is carried up by hand to the house, and the animals 

 are driven down to the water, and the garden is neglected because 

 it is too hard work to haul water up to it. Of course, there are many 

 cases where such an obvious resource of the farm has been utilized, 

 but there are many where it is neglected. 



Many springs on the hillsides are allowed to be trampled into 

 mudholes by the stock, which need but cleaning out and opening 

 up to yield a water-flow beyond any amount which the old outcrop- 



