Fertilizing Value of Water 251 



plication of excessive amounts of water, when injury would fol- 

 low certainly, and sooner than where warmer water is at hand. 



Warm water is better than cold, and in making a choice of 

 waters it is, of course, best to select the warmest where this can 

 be done. But the point we wish to emphasize is, that well and 

 spring water and mountain streams may be used to advantage 

 for irrigation where warmer water is not at hand. Mr. Crane- 

 field* has experimented with tomatoes, radishes and beans grown 

 in a greenhouse and in the garden, irrigated with water at 32, 

 and has found them to do nearly as well as those given water at 

 70 or 100. 



The writer waters his own garden and lawn directly from a 

 well with water having a temperature of 48 to 50 F., and the 

 present year we cut with a lawn mower, on 21,869 square feet 

 of lawn about the house, between May 6 and November 5, enough 

 grass to feed one cow all she needed for 95% days. On 90,709 

 square feet, including the lawn, or 2.08 acres, we this year fed, 

 by soiling, two cows and one horse from May 6 until November 

 5, and put into the barn besides 4.75 tons of hay, .14 acres of 

 this ground being in Stowell's Evergreen sweet corn. Three crops 

 of clover were cut from the same ground, and the third cutting, 

 November 1, averaged a ton of hay per acre, and was a little 

 past full bloom, and yet the watering was done directly from 

 the well with water at 48 F. 



FERTILIZING VALUE OF IRRIGATION WATER 



In traveling from place to place in Europe, it was 

 a continual surprise to the writer to learn from those 

 who were using water for the irrigation of meadows 

 that the fertility which the river waters added to the 

 soil was generally regarded as the chief advantage 

 derived from them. The vast volumes of water which 

 are sometimes used for this purpose have already been 

 cited. 



*Fifteenth Ann. Kept. Wis. Agr. Exp. Station, p. 250. 



