1192 
such a provision on the point. But by 
and in itself, a purchase of land is not 
a purchase of any right to water for that 
land, and any right to water which he 
may get through such purchase will come 
to him by other means than the mere 
act of purchase. 
It is in consequence of the vagueness of 
the notions of most persons unfamiliar 
with irrigation, concerning rights to wa- 
ter, that the author has taken it upon 
himself to write this series of popular 
articles upon a subject which has been 
so well covered by able writers upon the 
law, that he comes to his subject feeling 
that any attempt by him to do more than 
paraphrase what has by them been writ- 
ten would be presumptuous. The pur- 
pose of this series is rather to state as 
clearly as may be possible some of the 
more obvious points of the law. 
H. R. Lince, 
Fig. 5. Artesian Well of Mr. 
Pomona, Washington. This well is 400 feet 
deep. The pressure is 60 pounds per square 
inch and delivers 2,250 gallons per minute 
through an §8-inch pipe. The altitude is 
1,250 feet. The well irrigates 500 acres 220 
feet above the Yakima River. 
DEFINITIONS OF “BENEFICIAL” AND 
“ECONOMICAL” USE OF WATER 
Published by the Irrigation Age 
Beneficial Use of Water 
A water user with a vested right lim- 
ited to beneficial use is entitled to that 
amount of water which will render him a 
reasonable maximum amount of good 
with a reasonably economic handling of 
the water. Since he has acquired his 
vested right from the laws of his state, 
he is entitled to protection of that right 
by the state; but it is his duty to the 
state, and the state has the right to de- 
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE 
mand of him, that he use every reason- 
able method to reduce the amount of 
water required to a minimum. This de- 
mand requires the water user to make 
reasonable preparation of the ground sur- 
face for irrigation; to use good judgment 
in selecting appropriate methods of ap- 
plying the water to the ground; to pre- 
pare reasonably efficient dikes, ditches 
and structures to get the water over the 
land in such a way as to reduce the un- 
derground losses to a minimum to irri- 
gate the ground with such a head and at 
such intervals as to require a minimum 
use of water for proper irrigation; to 
cultivate the irrigated ground when prac- 
ticable to prevent undue losses from evap- 
oration; in some cases possibly to govern 
the character of crops to be grown. It is 
evident that the reasonable degree of per- 
fection of each of these requirements will 
vary with the locality and with different 
and changing conditions in each locality, 
so that the beneficial use of water is 
variable. 
Economical Use of Water 
Since the water supply available for 
irrigation in the Western states is ade- 
quate for only a relatively small percent- 
age of the entire irrigable acreage, the 
fundamental standard of economical use 
must be the financial results accomplished 
per acre-foot of water applied rather than 
the yield per acre irrigated. It therefore 
becomes both necessary and desirable to 
impress irrigators with the fact that in 
general the largest net profits per acre- 
foot of water applied are obtained, not 
from using excessive quantities, but from 
more careful use of relatively small quan- 
tities. In developing a more economical 
standard for the use of water, it should 
not be presumed that established rights 
can be limited to less water than they 
would carry under the accepted rule of 
beneficial use; yet by constantly bearing 
in mind that the ideal ultimately neces- 
Sary must be the highest net profit per 
unit of water applied, irrigators may 
gradually be induced in many instances 
to obtain for themselves those results, and 
those undertaking the construction of 
new projects may be induced to so design 
