1880.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
503 
Irrigation in Shadtown. 
BY TIMOTHY BUNKER, ESQ. 
Mr. Editor.— Since my experiment in “the irri¬ 
tation of the land,” twenty years ago, on the Horse 
Pond lot, the physic has been working slowly, 
but quite surely, in all the neighborhood. It took 
Jake Frink a great while to understand the philos¬ 
ophy of draining at the bottom, and pouring water 
on top, and he does not fairly understand it now. 
He was wont to put the case in this style : 
“ Te see, Squire Bunker, it is no kind o’ use to 
pour so much water on to the top of the land, that’s 
what’s the matter with half the pastering I’ve got. 
It has too much water already. Jest look at the 
back part of my cow paster. It’s covered with 
water all the spring, and skunk cabbage, poke 
root, and brakes grow like weeds all through the 
summer, but grass is mighty skase. Ef ye sow 
grass seed on’t, it don’t seem to do any kind of 
good. It gets killed in the winter, or choked out 
by the weeds. A feller has to be mighty smart 
with the bush scythe to keep down'the hardhack. 
the alders, the wild roses, maples, and elms that 
keep springing up. ’Taint much use to be fightin’ 
etarnally with the nateral bent of the sile. Some 
sile was made to grow hardhack and skunk cab¬ 
bage, and it’s agin nater for it to produce clover 
and red top. I can see that there’s some sense in 
draining off water from such land, but when you 
come to pouring on more water on top, it seems to 
be making a bad matter worse.” 
But Jake did not apply his sense to his cow pasture, 
did not dig any ditches to draw off the surface water, 
and it has run largely to brush. But there was the 
living argument of the Horse Pond lot, with drains 
at the bottom and irrigation at the top, which con¬ 
tradicted his philosophy and kept him in a stew. 
His neighbors who attend the Farmer’s Club, and 
take the American Agriculturist, had more faith and 
believed facts, if they could not explain them. 
Threq tons to the acre was worth looking at 
and striving after, whether they could understand 
it or not. They began to look about for small 
streams upon their farms, that could be turned 
out of their course upon the neighboring upland. 
Small ventures were successful. Grass sprang up 
in the track of the water, earlier in the spring, was 
more abundant in the summer, and lingered longer 
in the fall, and was sometimes green at Christmas. 
There was no mistaking the fact. Irrigation often 
came up in the Club. The irrigation ditches mul¬ 
tiplied. Idle streams were utilized. Stunted, grav¬ 
elly pastures grew green, and the sod thickened, 
meadows yielded more hay. Stacks multiplied, the 
barns had to be enlarged, and many farms increased 
their stock. Irrigation was a success, and Tim 
Bunker had carried his pint, according to the 
prophecy of Seth Twiggs. 
This summer I was over in Shadtown, to visit 
the farm of Solomon Wise. It consists of 225 acres 
of land, of average quality with the farms in the 
neighborhood. It has been the homestead of the 
family for three generations at least. Here Solo¬ 
mon’s father lived, an enterprising farmer in his 
time, and did a large business in raising mules, 
and in trading them off for the West India market. 
Some fifty years ago, or more, he bought a cele¬ 
brated Jack, and greatly increased the size of his 
mules, for which there was then a lively demand. 
The beginning of the system of irrigation that 
prevails upon this farm dates back to the time of 
his grandfather, a hundred years ago or more. Any 
good farmer, in riding by, would notice the excep¬ 
tional greenness and fertility of this farm. This is 
owing mainly to the free use of water for a hundred 
years or more upon about 40 acres of the farm. 
The system of irrigation is of the simplest and 
most inexpensive kind, just such as any skillful 
farmer could make for himself, without the aid of 
stone mason or engineer. Near the north end of 
the farm a small trout brook comes in, never big 
enough for a mill stream, and, in summer, dwind¬ 
ling away to a mere rill. It is fed by springs, and 
in these springs the trout survive through the heats 
of summer. This brook is dammed near the spot 
where it enters the farm, with a slight hank of earth 
and stone. No effort has been made to accumulate 
water in a reservoir, though it could be done at a 
small expense. The brook rises in a swamp a mile 
or two above, and the basin embraces several 
thousand acres, which would collect a large supply 
of water, if it was husbanded. Only a part of the 
natural flow of the water has been turned out of 
its channel. The irrigating ditches, of which there 
are several taken from the main stream, are small 
and narrow, and have a very slight fall. They could 
be made very rapidly with a plow and ox-shovel. 
The forty acres put under water slopes gently to 
the south and east. The water is taken out of 
these irrigating ditches in slight rills, and passed 
over the meadow as evenly as possible. Any sur¬ 
plus water falls into the ditch below, or is re¬ 
turned to the brook. The distance for which the 
water is diverted from its natural channel is less 
than a quarter of a mile. The water is kept flow¬ 
ing summer and winter, and the winter flowage 
carries quite as much fertilizing matter as that of 
summer, and perhaps more. The refuse vegetable 
matter, gathered in the swamp above, floating 
leaves, wash of roads and brook channel, is carried 
down to these meadows. The water is often dis¬ 
colored in heavy rains, and even that which seems 
to be pure, carries more or less sediment with it. 
The liquid manure may be very thin, but the fact 
is well established that, wherever water runs over 
a well-drained soil, grass springs up in greater 
luxuriance. The purest spring water makes grass 
wherever it flows. While Solomon Wise sleeps, in 
summer and winter, this brook is making money 
for him, as it did for his father. The only expense 
to him is the slight labor of keeping the ditches 
clear, and of regulating the flow of the water. The 
soil is a gravelly loam, and slopes so much that 
there is little chance of stagnant water. In the 
opinion of Mr. Wise, the crop of grass is doubled 
by the irrigation alone. 
There are several advantages of this system of 
irrigation besides the large increase of the grass 
crop. All these forty acres of meadow can be kept 
perpetually in grass, which is probably the most 
profitable crop upon the farms of New England. 
There need be no more plowing, no more tillage 
crops upon these acres. The sod may thicken from 
generation to generation, and produce that best of 
all forage, a thick, fine hay, made from a mixture 
of grasses grown upon an old sod. Then top¬ 
dressing, when it is applied, can be turned to the 
best advantage. The manure is carried down imme¬ 
diately to the roots of grasses by the large supply 
of water upon the surface. There is no loss from 
evaporation. The soil is kept up to a production 
of nearly two tons of hay to the acre, without any 
top-dressing. Upon this the calculation is based 
of the value of irrigation upon this farm. We 
suppose the natural production of the land to be 
not over a ton to the acre. A ton to the acre would 
be a fair estimate of the hay made by the irrigation. 
Hay sells in the neighboring city markets at from 
fifteen to twenty dollars a ton, depending some¬ 
what on the season, and the quality. If we call 
the hay ten dollars a ton standing, it would give 
$400 as the annual dividend declared by the brook. 
The investment is about as secure as Government 
bonds, which pay 4 per cent nearly. The income 
is about the same as $10,000 in United States Stocks. 
Not every farm has the facilities of this for irriga¬ 
tion, but many have small streams running to waste 
that might be utilized at small expense, and made 
to pay good dividends. Let us look after them. 
Ilookerlown. Ct., I Yours to command, 
Nov. 1,1880. j Timothy Bunker, Esq. 
Accumulation of Manure in Stables.— 
A large mass of dung, unless frozen or kept near 
the freeeing point, will undergo decomposition, 
and gives off, besides steam, ammonia, and other 
gases. These tend to soften and injure the hoofs 
of animals, and especially horses, that may be forced 
to stand continuously upon the accumulation of 
dung. These gases cause inflammation of the eyes, 
and injure the general health, interfere with the 
digestion, and reduce the vigor of the animal. 
There should be no mass of manure in any stable 
where horses are kept. A clean floor and pure air 
are requisites for the best health of the animals. 
The Rib-Grass, or English Plantain, 
Among the plants recently sent in for naming and 
information upon its fodder value is the Rib-grass 
(Plantago lanceolata). The letter accompanying the 
plants stated, the “newcomer must have been 
introduced in the clover seed, as it first appeared 
upon the farm in the clover field.” This is prob¬ 
ably true, as this weed is most commonly carried 
into the newer settled portions of our country in 
clover seed. The seed of the Rib-grass and Clover 
are so nearly alike in size and color that their sep¬ 
aration is effected with difficulty, and the presence 
of the weed seed is not noticed without more than 
ordinary inspection. By the aid of a hand-lens or 
pocket magnifier, the differences are shown at once. 
RIB-GRASS, OB ENGLISH PLANTAIN. 
The Clover 6eed is in shape much like a small bean, 
and alike on both sides, while the Rib-grass seed is 
convex on one side, and concave on the other. 
The differences are shown in the seeds in the up¬ 
per part of the engraving, those on the right being 
those of the common Red Clover, with one seed 
considerably enlarged, and on the left those of 
the Rib-grass. The Rib-grass belongs to the same 
genus as the Common Plantain, so frequently found 
about our door-yards, but differs from it in growing 
to a greater hight, the leaves being long and slen¬ 
der, and the long flower stalk bearing a compar¬ 
atively short spike or head of inconspicuous flowers. 
The engraving is a much reduced one of a Rib- 
grass plant with its strong perennial root, and will 
be quickly recognized by many farmers, especially 
in the older parts of our country. This Rib-grass 
cannot be classed among the worst of weeds; in 
fact, it has been frequently sown for pasturage; 
it is eaten by nearly all kinds of farm stock, 
especially sheep. It is so inferior in quality and 
productiveness to many other forage plants, that its 
chief harm is in occupying the soil to the exclusion 
of better plants. Great care should be taken to 
sow only pure seed—inspect all clover and other 
seed coming from older parts of the country. 
The plants may be choked out by a heavy growth 
of clover and other valuable crops. 
