THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



41 



usually be experienced. Never plant alfalfa in the 

 bottom of a depression that does not have surface 

 drainage. 



Preparation of Ground for Irrigation 



There are two types of irrigation systems 

 adapted to alfalfa in this province, namely, free 

 flooding and flooding between borders, though the 

 furrow or corrugation system might be used to some 

 advantage in certain districts. Free flooding con- 

 sists of flooding Wjater between more or less parallel 

 head ditches, spaced from fifty to two hundred feet 

 apart. With this system, as with all others, if effi- 

 cient irrigation is desired, all knolls and depressions 

 must be removed, so that water can run uninter- 

 ruptedly without pooling up from one head ditch to 

 the next one .below it. The larger knolls and de- 

 pressions should be smoothed off with a Fresno 

 scraper, as this tool, where the haul is short, will 

 move quicker and cheaper than any other imple- 

 ment in common use. After the larger knolls and 

 depressions have been smoothed off with a 

 scraper, a rectangular leveller, with which you all 

 should be familiar, should be run over the ground, 

 both lengthwise and crosswise of the field. 



The head ditches with free flooding should be 

 run on a uniform of grade of from one-tenth to 

 three-tenths of a foot fall per hundred feet. They 

 should be installed more or less parallel to one an- 

 other, the proper distance between them depending 

 somewhat upon the topography and nature of the 

 soil. From fifty to two hundred feet apart has been 

 found to be the proper spacing for this section. One 

 ditch should be used at a time for the irrigation, the 

 water being dammed up at frequent intervals by 

 canvas dams, and turned out into the field through 

 notches cut with the shovel in the lower ditch bank 

 by the irrigator. If the levelling has been carefully 

 done, and the irrigator gives the water careful at- 

 tention, very efficient irrigation can be accomplished 

 by this system. There should not be much waste 

 water, but whatever water that is wasted should be 

 caught up in the next ditch below and used for the 

 irrigation of the next strip. 



Flooding Between Borders 



This system is probably best adapted for alfalfa 

 on practically all of the various types of soil found 

 in the province. 



So far as topography is concerned, it can be 

 used on all but the steeper grades, approximately 

 one hundred feet per mile being the maximum slope 

 with which it should be used for alfalfa. The head 

 ditches with this system are constructed in about 

 the same manner and about the same or a little 

 greater distance apart as with the free flooding sys- 

 tem. The only essential difference between this 

 system and the free flooding system is that more or 

 less parallel border guiding dykes are constructed 30 

 to 60 feet apart between the head ditches, and more 

 or less at right angles to them. The water is 

 checked up in the ditch with canvas dams as before, 

 and is flooded between the border guiding dykes to 

 the next head ditch below, the dykes guiding and 

 controlling the water in a much more efficient man- 

 ner than with the free flooding, where the water is 

 unconfined, and requires careful attention from the 

 irrigator. To be ideally laid out for irrigation by 



this system the side fall should be taken out of each 

 strip in other words it should be made approxi- 

 mately level crosswise throughout its length. It is 

 not necessary, however, to make the lengthwise 

 slope uniform, it simply being necessary, the same 

 as with the free flooding system, to smooth off the 

 knolls and depressions sufficiently so that water may 

 run interruptedly from one head ditch to the next 

 one below. In actual practice where the land is not 

 too steep these parallel border guiding dykes usually 

 run down the greatest slope, for this is the direction 

 the water will naturally run with the least attention. 

 There will also be less side fall in each strip than as 

 if the border dykes angled down the slope. The 

 dykes are usually constructed at the time the level- 

 ling is done, the dirt being deposited on the location 

 of the dykes by the Fresno. Where but little 

 Fresno work is necessary the dykes are made by 

 ploughing a back furrow consisting of two or four 

 furrows on the proposed location of each dyke. The 

 dykes are afterwards gone over by a ridger, which 

 is run lengthwise of the back furrow. This ridger 

 consists essentially of two 2x12 planks, 16 to 18 feet 

 long, placed on edge with a spread in front of from 

 12 to 14 feet and only approximately 3 feet behind. 

 The wide end is pulled ahead, thus gathering a 

 shallow layer of dirt from quite a wide area on each 

 side of the back furrow, the dirt being pulled against 

 the side of the back furrow by the sloping sides of 

 the ridger. These ridges are afterwards smoothed 

 down and rounded over by harrowing them lightly, 

 the alfalfa being planted across the top of the ridges 

 in the same way and at the same rate as between. If 

 these ridges are constructed in this manner they will 

 be high enough to control the water, yet broad and 

 low enough so that alfalfa will grow on the tops of 

 them, and the wagons and hay tools can cross them 

 with no inconvenience whatever. The ridges when 

 completed should be from 6 to 9 inches high in the 

 center and from 2 to 3 feet broad at the base. 



In practice the water is turned into the head of 

 each strip at two or more places and spreads quite 

 uniformly between the two guiding dykes, as it ad- 

 vances across the strip. The irrigator should cut it 

 off and turn it into the next strip below as soon as 

 the water has advanced far enot gh so that the quan- 

 tity in the strip will advance to the lower end and 

 thoroughly irrigate the bottom portion. 



This system is a very efficient one, for not only 

 alfalfa but all other grasses, and provided the 

 ground is properly prepared for it at the start, will 

 be found that the water will actually require less 

 attention and that more acres can be irrigated in a 

 day with less work than by means of any other 

 system. 



Preparation of Seed Bed 



The preparation of a proper seed bed for alfalfa 

 is very important. Alfalfa has a small seed, and the 

 plant for the first two or three months is rather weak 

 and puny. It, therefore, requires a well cultivated 

 seed bed, for a good stand cannot be secured if it is 

 planted in rough, cloddy ground. Alfalfa plants 

 are quite spindling and grow so slowly during the 

 first two or three months of their growth that the 

 weeds in a very weedy field will sometimes either 

 entirely crowd out the alfalfa or be the means of 



