1851. 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
55 
thority not only of Mr. Clapp but the workmen, 
that it was well cured. The crop was all weighed, 
and yielded 29 tons, and 497 pounds. In Septem¬ 
ber, the second crop was cut and weighed, and pro¬ 
duced 14 tons and 97 pounds—making together 43 
tons 594 pounds. The area of the lot is 7 acres and 
100 rods. This is very nearly six tons to the acre.” 
The hay is stated to have been sold at $10 per ton, 
which gives the yearly income of $432 for the 7 
acres and 100 rods. The Republican states that the 
lot was formerly quite uneven. Mr. Clapp leveled 
it, and plowed and subsoiled it, after which it was 
seeded to grass. It has since been annually top- 
dressed with about 100 loads of manure, which costs 
one dollar a load. The crops have been extraordi¬ 
nary, that of 1849 having been nearly equal to that 
of 1850. 
Irrigation. 
Editors Cultivator —I read with much pleasure, 
an article under this head, in your December number: 
yet there are some parts of it, in which I do not 
concur, and which I think erroneous as regards the 
eastern or middle sections of the United States. It 
is stated that “ the proper season is from about 
Michaelmas till Lady-day; but Mr. Turner entirely 
objects to summer irrigation, as forcing the land too 
much, and as calculated to give the sheep, who then 
depasture upon it, the rot.” 
My experience, of 30 years, is entirely different. 
I have used water in irrigation, on mowing 4 lands, 
from as early in the spring as the frost is out of the 
ground, until about the time of making hay on the 
land; and after the hay has been gathered into the 
barn, occasionally until the setting in of the frost 
of the succeeding winter; and have had no reason 
to believe that I was “ forcing the land too much.” 
Some of my land has been in grass for the whole 
period, and has had no manure, except that derived 
from the water, and the droppings of the cattle, 
when feeding off the aftermath. The hay crop has 
been larger of late years, than it was at the com¬ 
mencement of the time above stated, and the ave¬ 
rage crop is sufficiently large to satisfy the reason¬ 
able expectation of any farmer, even from his best 
land. I have for two winters allowed the water to 
run on my land, but shall not again irrigate at that 
season of the year. I received no injury, where the 
descent was so great, as not to allow the water to 
become stagnant, but in hollows, where the water 
was without motion, it would freeze over, and if the 
ice was transparent, so as to allow the sun’s rays to 
pass through, the grass was destroyed. 
Whether summer irrigation will produce the rot 
in sheep, I have no practical knowledge, but should 
think it improper that any animal should be pas¬ 
tured on irrigated land, when it is wet. My practice 
has been, to let on the water after haying, for several 
days, until I think it properly wet; I then shut it 
off, and when sufficiently dry, I allow my cattle to 
feed off the grass, and this I repeat from time to 
time through the season, as I have occasion. From 
this procedure, I have discovered no objection, ex¬ 
cept the additional labor in keeping the ditches in 
repair, which have been damaged by the hoofs of 
the animals feeding on the land. 
I also object to a part of Mr. Turner’s directions 
in relation to the construction of his second ditch; 
of the first and third I fully approve. He says “ in 
the liill-side meadows, the gutters conduct the water 
from a spring on the upper part of the hill-side, in 
a lateral, but oblique direction, with a gentle fall 
across the face of the hill. At the opposite side, 
but so arranged as to leave a considerable interval 
between each main gutter, it turns, and brings the 
stream back, at a lower point, across the face of the 
hill again, and somewhat parallel with the first line, 
but still descending, when it again turns, and so on 
till it reaches the bottom.” 
It will be perceived, that at the cc opposite side,” 
the space between the second and t’ .ird, and fourth 
and fifth ditches, will be greater than at any other 
place, so much so, that a portion would not be 
equally watered with the other land. I have also 
practiced side-hill irrigation. My practice has been 
to have my several ditches as parallel as the forma¬ 
tion of the land will allow, preserving a proper de¬ 
scent for the water, the water to run in the same 
general direction in the ditches. From every spring 
there is a channel down the hill, formed by the run¬ 
ning of the water. In this channel, I have small 
flumes or hatches, with gates, just below where I 
wish to commence my ditches; the first as high on 
the hill as I can use the water, and it is usually the 
case that ditches may be run each way from the 
channel on the side of the hill. I take the water 
into the highest ditch, and allow it to run over the 
side for its whole length, and as equally as is prac¬ 
ticable; it then passes over the pannel below, and in 
its course, from the inequality of the land, will get 
formed into little rills, to the ditch below. Hence 
it is desirable that the pannels should not be too 
wide. The water is intercepted by the second ditch, 
and by it, in the same manner is diffused over the 
land. And so on for the whole face of the hill, if 
there is sufficient water to irrigate the whole of the 
land at the same time, which is not often the case. 
If the supply of water is insufficient for that pur¬ 
pose, I first irrigate so much of the higher part of 
the field as I have water for, then let it run down 
the original channel to a pannel, where I wish to 
use a part or the whole of it, and there irrigate as 
on the first pannel. I have found that the effect was 
more beneficial, when the water was made to run 
over the side of the ditch, and strain through the 
stems of the grass, than where it moistened the roots 
of the grass by percolating through the earth. Each 
