COST OF PRODUCING APPLES IN HOOD RIVER VALLEY. 



29 



under occasionally. The advantage of the mulch-crop system over 

 the clean-cultural apparent here may or may not hold good in other 

 sections. It depends entirely on whether or not the soil can be kept 

 from being depleted and the trees in good health by natural soil 

 fertility. 



IRRIGATION. 



Irrigation has become general in the valley only during the last 

 5 years and mostly within the last 3 years, and is rapidly extending. 

 With the practice of irrigation has come an effort to restore nitrogen to 

 the soil by the aid of clover and other legumes. Both irrigation and 

 the practice of sowing legumes are confined largely to the old 



Fig. 11. — An irrigation lateral in the Oak Grove district of Hood River Valley. 



orchards, it not being thought necessary, in most cases, to irrigate 

 a young orchard not yet in bearing. 



The growers of the lower valley are served by three main irriga- 

 tion ditches. Those on the east side of the river, including practi- 

 cally all the men whose records figure in this investigation, receive 

 water from the East Fork irrigation ditch, while those on the west 

 side receive water from the Hood River irrigation district canal 

 and the Farmers' Irrigating Co. canal. The East Fork and the 

 Hood Eiver irrigation ditches are in bonded districts, while the 

 Farmers' Irrigating Co. is not. The East Fork company, organized 

 in 1895, was operated as a stock company of farmers until 1913, when 



