PEOGRESS IF RECLAMATTOlSr BISSELL. 499 
ADVANTAGES OF IRRIGATION FARMING. 
Agriculture in the arid region where irrigation is feasible has 
several important advantages over that in the humid region. The 
soils of the arid region by the nature of the case have generally not 
been leached of their mineral plant foods as have those in the humid 
region, and they are therefore much richer in this respect on the 
average and are seldom or never acid, as are soils in the humid 
region. This quality has the disadvantage at times of leaving the 
arid lands charged with hurtful alkalis, which seldom remain in 
the soil of the humid region on account of their solubility, but 
where the injurious salts do not predominate the general principle 
of abundance of mineral plant food obtains and constitutes a distinct 
advantage over the soils of humid regions. 
There is much advantage in being able to apply water to growing 
crops at just the time and in just the quantity needed and to withhold 
it at will. W'liere the water supply is ample this constitutes a very 
important advantage in arid regions. 
Another striking advantage is the preponderance of clear days in 
an arid region, where the absence of rainy and cloudy weather affords 
a much larger percentage of sunshine than is found in humid re- 
gions. As sunlight is one of the most important essentials of healthy 
plant growth, this advantage is quite important. 
Kesulting from these advantages, it appears that the average gross 
product of agricultural crops on reclamation projects is just about 
double the average yield from nonirrigated lands in the country at 
large. The larger product obtainable per acre from irrigated lands 
justifies and permits a more careful and intensive cultivation, which 
with a favorable climate and controllable water supply, yields more 
certain results than the same care in the humid region. 
This means that as much product can be obtained from a 40-acre 
tract under irrigation as from the average 80-acre tract in the humid 
region. This, of course, requires more labor per acre, but much less 
labor in proportion to product. It permits and encourages intensive 
cultivation and smaller holdings and consequent greater centraliza- 
tion of population. The result is that the isolation of country life is 
to a large extent eliminated, as the irrigating farmer will have fully 
twice as many neighbors within a given radius as his prototype in 
the humid region. The social advantages thus obtained react upon 
the character of the people and of the communities and other condi- 
tions characteristic of irrigated regions have a similar effect. 
Cooperation with his neighbors is forced upon the irrigator because 
it is usually impracticable for him to irrigate his land w^ithout such 
cooperation, the feasible irrigation projects usually being in tracts 
of many thousands of acres accommodating thousands of families 
