THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



149 



. \nother 



hog-alfalfa game. 

 Hogs in this cli- 

 mate are remark- 

 a b 1 y healthful, 

 very little trouble 

 and grow like 

 weeds on alfalfa 

 and this pure well 

 water. 



Henry Scheutte 

 grazed ninety - 

 four head of hogs 

 on a six - acre 

 patch of alfalfa 

 and with a light 

 grain ration made 

 excellent gains. 

 D. P. Vaughn 

 raised 141 pure- 

 bred Jersey Du- 

 rocs on seven 

 acres of alfalfa 

 macle money. J. 

 R. Robinson ran 

 two hundred head 

 on twenty acres 

 of alfalfa until 

 they were put in 

 the fattening pen 

 no other feed 

 except the graz- 

 ing. These hogs were finished on kafir corn, sold 

 in competition with corn-fed hogs at 7y 2 cents, and 

 averaged 247 pounds, in Fort Worth. 



J. R. Webster got 1,728 pounds per acre on a 

 bunch of pigs grazed from June 15 till November 1, 

 which, at 6 cents, makes $103.68 from each acre of 

 alfalfa. In these days of high priced meat hog- 

 raising is a very profitable branch of irrigation farm- 

 ing. 



Kafir corn and milo maize are successfully and 

 profitably grown under irrigation and are excellent 

 substitutes for corn. Hogs, cattle and sheep are 

 full fed on these grains and when finished sell right 

 along with corn-fed stuff. For finishing cattle the 

 kafir and milo are ground to a chop and supple- 

 mented with silage, alfalfa hay, cane hay and cot- 

 ton seed meal. This makes a well balanced ration 

 as well as a cheap one and gains of 3 J /2 pounds a 

 day are not uncommon. 



\\ "heat, oats and barley do well. All the fruits 

 and vegetables grown in a temperate climate grow 

 to perfection, as is well demonstrated by the four 

 hundred gardens watered from Hereford's battefy 

 of windmills. With a small patch of ground and a 

 windmill the "wolf" will not bother your door. 



With the development of this country under 

 irrigation, great strides have been made in the per- 

 fection of power for driving pumps as well as in the 

 pumps themselves. The operating cost of these 

 engines is so low that water pumped from wells 

 compares more than favorably with the cost of 

 water from many of the best gravity systems of 

 irrigation. The average cost of irrigation from 

 wells at Hereford for 1914 is, $1.50 an acre. This 

 cost is based on the total yearly operating cost as 

 given by the farmer and includes all charges paid 



Santa Fe Railroad. 



out by each farm- 

 er without regard 

 for waste, leak- 

 age or any finely 

 drawn test. To 

 show the cost of 

 water pumped 

 from several 

 wells just a few 

 examples are 

 given. 



The D. P. 

 Vaughn well, two 

 miles north of 

 Hereford, is 

 equipped with a 

 40 H. P. Besse- 

 mer Oil Engine 

 driving a number 

 five Layne tur- 

 bine pump. The 

 well delivered 

 1,200 gallons a 

 minute on a total 

 head of sixty-five 

 feet. The engine 

 used five gallons 

 of 4-cent fuel oil 

 per hour, which, 

 with lubricating 

 oil, makes an 

 hourly cost of 22 cents. It required 4.6 hours to 

 pump an acre foot of water at a cost of approxi- 

 mately $1.00. 



The Weliver & Pollock well is driven by a 60 

 H. P. Bessemer Oil Engine and puts the water into 

 the ditch for $1.10 an acre foot. This engine con- 

 sumes seven gallons of 4-cent oil per hour and with 

 a flow of 1,500 gallons a minute requires 3.6 hours 

 to pump a foot of water. 



The J. R. Robinson well, located 2y 2 miles 

 southeast of Hereford, was accurately tested by the 

 Santa Fe railroad engineering department and un- 

 der a 24-hour run showed 1,180 gallons per minute, 

 or 5.2 acre feet every twenty-four hours. The 40 

 H. P. engine consumed 4 l / 2 gallons of 4-cent fuel 

 oil per hour, or 92 cents for each acre foot of water 

 pumped. The pump used is a two-stage turbine. 

 The C. W. Sowers well, two miles south of 

 Hereford, was also measured by the Santa Fe engi- 

 neers and showed 1,400 gallons a minute. On every 

 day irrigation Mr. Sowers says his engine uses four 

 gallons of fuel oil per hour. On this consumption 

 the water cost is approximately 70 cents an acre 

 foot with oil at 4 cents a gallon. The 50 H. P. 

 engine pulling this -well operated on a shade under 

 .6 pint per horsepower hour. 



The engines require little attention. Each en- 

 gine is started in the morning by the irrigator, who 

 then goes down the ditch with the water. No fur- 

 ther attention is paid to the engine or pumping 

 plant until night, when it is shut down until the 

 next morning. Some of the farmers run both night 

 and day, but this is done only in emergencies. The 

 installations include perfect cooling arrangements, 

 mechanical lubrication for both engine and pump, 

 automatic stopping device which shuts off the fuel 



