18 
In this case most of the water is applied in the winter, though some 
374 feet in depth was applied from April to July, of which 88 feet 
were absorbed. 
For meadows where summer irrigation is more the rule, or 
for the same meadow during a corresponding season, the amount 
used is still much greater than is the custom indicated above. In 
the meadow of Capt. Post, the depth found is, if anything, too great 
On the meadow of Saint Die in the Vosges, the water applied from 
May 8 to August 11, a period nearly the same as on Capt. Post’s 
meadow, was equivalent to a depth of 120 feet (36.7 metres), of 
which, however, 112 feet ran off (34.2 metres), leaving a depth of 
8 feet absorbed by the meadow. Ordinarily, Mangon says, in drier 
years one or two more irrigations are given. (P. 47.) 
Another meadow, that of Taillades in Vaucluse, in Southern 
France, between June 5 and September 13 received water to a depth 
of 5.25 feet (1.63 metres), of which .05 feet (.32 metre) was collected 
in the waste ditches, leaving 4.20 feet as the net amount of water 
absorbed. (Mangon, p. 26). This was given in 13 irrigations. Or¬ 
dinarily 25 are given, each one requiring the same amount of water. 
THE NO. 2 CANAL. 
It was desirable to find the amount of water used by a whole 
community under one ditch, and by the kindness of the oflScers of 
this canal a self-recording instrument w^as placed in their measuring 
flume in 1891, and records continued through 1892. This canal 
was one of the first planned and built by the Union Colony of 
Greeley, being laid out by E. S. Nettleton in 1870. It has been sev¬ 
eral times enlarged, so that now its official rating calls for 585 cubic 
feet per second. There are three hundred water rights in the canal, 
each of which is considered sufficient for 80 acres. The area watered 
is closely 24,000 acres. The last report of the Water Commissioner 
makes the acreage 26,800 acres, of which 400 is watered by seepage 
water and 2,500 by reservoirs. 
Its early construction, together with the long experience of most 
of the farmers underneath it, show perhaps better than any other 
canal easily accessible, the average of good practice in the valley when 
water is to be obtained at most parts of the growing season. The un¬ 
certainties in the amount of water in the river are such that farmers 
are constantly pressed to use water at times when they otherwise 
would not for fear there will be scarcity when it is needed. This 
compulsion of conditions affects the later canals the most, as they are 
the ones which are the soonest shut down in case of low water. While 
the pressure causes farmers with small amounts of water to study 
means of economizing the water to the utmost, the duty is more apt to 
be abnormally high, though on the other hand it might be contended 
that their practice would show what could be done with water better 
than the older ones. Even in the canal under oonsideration, the 
