THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



11 



USE STEEL RODS IN SETTING CANVAS DAMS 



IN setting canvas dams the aid of steel rods saves 

 labor and ditch banks. This plan has been tried 

 out by ranchers near Fort Collins, Colo. 



Their water is applied in heads of three and four 

 feet per second from ditches three feet and more 

 deep, and no soil is dug from field or banks to 

 weight the laps of the canvas. The irrigators find 

 the dams are much easier set and lifted and are 

 more stable than when set the old, laborious way. 



The rods may be made of round half-inch steel, 

 which costs Z l / 2 c a pound, about six cents for a four- 

 foot rod, or preferably of broken hayrake teeth, 

 which are stronger, lighter and cheaper. The teeth 

 may be hammered straight when mildly heated, and 

 effectively welded by lapping the ends an inch or 

 more. They are of self-tempered steel and are not 

 seriously weakened in mending. They should be 

 shaped like the end-gate wagon-bed rods, sharpened 

 and slightly longer than the ditch is deep. 



Fix some large eye-screws into the back side 

 of the dam pole and stick a rod through each eye 

 and down to the rear and under the bagging part 

 of the canvas. The rods are placed from six to ten 

 inches apart, depending on the depth of the ditch. 

 Sew strong cloth loops to either front corner of the 

 canvas and through each loop press one of the rods, 

 leaning them up stream and thus pin the canvas lap 

 to the bottom of the ditch. 



OREGON GUSHER STARTS BOOM 



An artesian well with a capacity of between 

 two hundred and fifty and three hundred gallons per 

 minute was brought in recently by the drill of W. 

 D. Newlon on the R. B. Rice place between Lexing- 

 ton and Stanfield, Ore., at a depth of 607 feet. The 

 well is capable of irrigating over two hundred acres 



of land, and its success is expected to be the signal 

 for the greatest development in irrigation which 

 Eastern Oregon has ever seen. Thousands of acres 

 of land which have gone begging at $10.00 to $15.00 

 per acre in the immediate vicinity of the well can- 

 not be bought for many times that price now, and 

 for the time being owners do not care to sell at any 

 price. 



TO HOLD MARKET CONFERENCE 



The Third National Conference on Marketing 

 and Farm Credits will be held in Chicago, Nov. 29 

 to Dec. 2. This conference, while providing oppor- 

 tunity for discussion ot all phases of agricultural de- 

 velopment and organization, is intended chiefly to 

 secure the framing of one or two bills to be pre- 

 sented to congress at its coming session. It is be- 

 lieved that by bringing representatives of the Na- 

 tional Farmers' Union, the National Grange, state 

 branches of the American Society of Equity and the 

 National Council of Farmers' Co-operative Associa- 

 tions into one body where they can meet and discuss 

 the various phases of proposed legislation with rep- 

 resentatives of the American Bankers' Associations, 

 the Farm Mortgage Bankers' Associations and the 

 joint committee on rural credits of the United States 

 Senate and House of Representatives, the short cut 

 to immediate action will have been taken. 



The silo yields greater returns in proportion to 

 cost than any other building on the farm. Let's 

 build a silo. 



Straight garden or orchard rows give a better 

 appearance and are easier to cultivate. 



NEWS NUGGETS ABOUT IRRIGATION PROJECTS 



Idaho 



The Idaho irrigation and drainage 

 code commission, after extensive in- 

 vestigation, has recommended reduc- 

 ing the irrigable area of the Idaho 

 Irrigation Company project in Elaine. 

 Lincoln and Gooding counties from 

 150,153 acres of Carey act land to 90,- 

 000 acres. It also recommends stop- 

 ping the sale of any more land in the 

 project, as it is claimed in the pres- 

 ent condition the project system can- 

 not irrigate more than 40,000 acres. 



The commission also recommends 

 that the Twin Falls-Salmon River 

 project be reduced from 73,348 to 26,- 

 000 acres. Such a reduction will leave 

 many settlers without water. 



The commission offers several plans 

 for handling the King Hill project, 

 which the state took over and on 

 which it has already spent $67,000. 



The Idaho supreme court has held. 



in the case of the City of Twin Falls 

 against the Twin Falls Waterworks 

 Company, that a municipality cannot 

 force the covering of an irrigation 

 canal for the safety of citizens by 

 passing an ordinance declaring such 

 a ditch a nuisance. 



The Idaho state land board looks 

 with favor on the proposal of the 

 Wickahoney Land & Irrigation Com- 

 pany to take over the affairs of the 

 Bruneau Irrigation Company and 

 complete an irrigation project for the 

 irrigation of 30,000 acres of rich agri- 

 cultural lands located in Owyhee 

 county along the Bruneau river and 

 the Wickahoney and Jacks creeks. 



David Miller, a representative of 

 (he Thayer-Moore Company of Kan- 

 sas City, appeared on behalf of that 

 financial concern, one of the largest 

 in the middle west, and stated that 

 his company was prepared to furnish 

 the financial backing for the project, 



or $750,000, which will be required to 

 install the canal and reservoir system. 



Nebraska 



A $2,000,000 irrigation project to in- 

 crease the productivity of Gosper, 

 Phelps and Kearney counties by $3,- 

 000,000 a year was laid before con- 

 gressmen and senators of Nebraska at 

 a huge meeting in Holdrege, Oct. 21, 

 in which 9,000 land owners partici- 

 pated. 



The organization, known as the Tri- 

 County Irrigation Project, with C. 

 W. McConaughty of Holdrege as 

 president, asked the national repre- 

 sentatives to bring before congress a 

 plan to develop the region. 



Water will be taken from a pro- 

 posed dam in the Platte river, accord- 

 ing to the plan, so that the rainfall 

 will be supplemented with an acre- 

 foot of water during the irrigation 

 closed season, from October until 



