What I know of farming Part 13

WESTERN IRRIGATION.

I have already set forth my belief that Irrigation is everywhere practicable, is destined to be generally adopted, and to prove signally beneficent. I do not mean that every acre of the States this side of the Missouri will ever be thus supplied with water, but that _some_ acres of every towns.h.i.+p, and of nearly every farm, should and will be. I propose herein to speak with direct reference to that large portion of our country which cannot be cultivated to any purpose without Irrigation.

This region, which is practically rainless in Summer, may be roughly indicated as extending from the forks of the Platte westward, and as including all our present Territories, a portion of Western Texas, the entire State of Nevada, and at least nine-tenths of California. On this vast area, no rain of consequence falls between April and November, while its soil, parched by fervid, cloudless suns, and swept by intensely dry winds, is utterly divested of moisture to a depth of three or four feet; and I have seen the tree known as Buckeye growing in it, at least six inches in diameter, whereon every leaf was withered and utterly dead before the end of August, though the tree still lived, and would renew its foliage next Spring.

Most of this broad area is usually spoken of as desert, because treeless, except on the slopes of its mountains, where certain evergreens would seem to dispense with moisture, and on the brink of infrequent and scanty streams, where the all but worthless Cotton-wood is often found growing luxuriantly. A very little low Gamma Gra.s.s on the Plains, some straggling Bunch-gra.s.s on the mountains, with an endless profusion of two poor shrubs, popularly known as Sage-brush and Grease-wood, compose the vegetation of nearly or quite a million square miles.

I will confine myself in this essay to the readiest means of irrigating the Plains, by which I mean the all but treeless plateau that stretches from the base of the Rocky Mountains, 300 to 400 miles eastward, sloping imperceptibly toward the Missouri, and drained by the affluents of the Platte, the Kansas, and the Arkansas rivers.

The North Platte has its sources in the western, as the South Platte has in the eastern, slopes of the Rocky Mountains. Each of them pursues a generally north-east course for some 300 miles, and then turns sharply to the eastward, uniting some 300 miles eastward of the mountains, where the Plains melt into the Prairies. Between these two rivers and the eastern base of the mountains lies an irregular delta or triangle, which seems susceptible of irrigation at a smaller cost than the residue. The location of Union Colony may be taken as a fair ill.u.s.tration of the process, and the facilities therefor afforded by nature.

Among the streams which, taking rise in the eastern gorges of the Rocky Mountains, run into the South Platte, the most considerable has somehow acquired the French name of Cache la Poudre. It heads in and about Long's Peak, and, after emerging from the mountains, runs some 20 to 25 miles nearly due east, with a descent in that distance of about 100 feet. Its waters are very low in Autumn and Winter, and highest in May, June and July, from the melting of snow and ice on the lofty mountains which feed it. Like all the streams of this region, it is broad and shallow, with its bed but three to four feet below the plains on either side.

Greeley, the nucleus of Union Colony, is located at the crossing of the Cache la Poudre by the Denver-Pacific Railroad, about midway of its course from the Kansas Pacific at Denver northward to the Union Pacific at Cheyenne. Here a village of some 400 to 500 houses has suddenly grown up during the past Summer.

The first irrigating ca.n.a.l of Union Colony leaves the Cache la Poudre six or eight miles above Greeley, on the south side, and is carried gradually further and further from the stream until it is fully a mile distant at the village, whence it is continued to the Platte. Branches or ditches lead thence northward, conveying rills through the streets of the village, the gardens or plats of its inhabitants, and the public square, or plaza, which is designed to be its chief ornament. Other branches lead to the farms and five-acre allotments whereby the village is surrounded; as still others will do in time to all the land between the ca.n.a.l and the river. In due time, another ca.n.a.l will be taken out from a point further up the stream, and will irrigate the lands of the colony lying south of the present ca.n.a.l, and which are meantime devoted to pasturage in common.

Taking the water out of the river is here a very simple matter. At the head of an island, a rude dam of brush and stones and earth is thrown across the bed of the stream, so as to raise the surface two or three feet when the water is lowest, and very much less when it is highest.

Thus deflected, a portion of the water flows easily into the ca.n.a.l.

A very much larger and longer ca.n.a.l, leaving the Cache la Poudre close to the mountains, and gradually increasing its distance from that stream to four or five miles, is now in progress by sections, and is to be completed this Winter. Its length will be thirty miles, and it will irrigate, when the necessary sub-ca.n.a.ls shall have been constructed, not less than 40,000 acres. But it may be ten years before all this work is completed or even required. The lands most easily watered from the main ca.n.a.l will be first brought into cultivation; the sub-ca.n.a.ls will be dug as they shall be wanted.

At first, members of the Colony arriving at its location, hesitated to take farm allotments and build upon them, from distrust of the capacities of the soil. They saw nothing of value growing upon it; the little gra.s.s found upon it was short, thin, and brown. It was not black, like the prairies and bottoms of Illinois and Kansas, but of a light yellow snuff-color, and deemed sterile by many. But a few took hold, and planted and sowed resolutely; and, though it was too late in the season for most grains, the results were most satisfactory. Wheat sown in June produced 30 bushels to the acre; Oats did as well; while Potatoes, Beets, Turnips, Squashes, Cabbages, etc., yielded bounteously; Tomatoes did likewise, but the plants were obtained from Denver. Little was done with Indian Corn, but that little turned out well, though I judge that the Summer nights are too cold here to justify sanguine expectations of a Corn-crop--the alt.i.tude being 5,000 feet above the sea, with snow-covered mountains always visible in the west. For other Grains, and for all Vegetables and Gra.s.ses, I believe there is no better soil in the world.

To many, the cost of Irrigation would seem so much added to the expense of cultivating without irrigation; but this is a mistake. Here is land entirely free from stump, or stick, or stone, which may easily and surely be plowed or seeded in March or April, and which will produce great crops of nearly every grain, gra.s.s or vegetable, with a very moderate outlay of labor to subdue and till it. The farmer need not lose three days per annum by rains in the growing season, and need not fear storm or shower when he seeks to harvest his gra.s.s or grain.

Nothing like ague or any malarious disease exhausts his vitality or paralyzes his strength. I saw men breaking up for the first time tracts which had received no water, using but a single span of horses as team; whereas, breaking up in the Prairie States involves a much larger outlay of power. The advantage of early sowing is very great; that of a long planting season hardly less so. I believe a farmer in this colony may keep his plow running through October, November, and a good portion of December; start it again by the 1st of March, and commence seeding with Wheat, Oats, and Barley, and keep seeding, including planting and gardening, until the first of June, which is soon enough to plant potatoes for Winter use. Thenceforth, he may keep the weeds out of his Corn, Roots, and Vegetables, for six Weeks or two months; and, as every day is a bright working-day, he can get on much faster than he could if liable to frequent interruptions by rains. I estimate the cost of bringing water to each farm at $5 per acre, and that of leading it about in sub-ditches, so that it shall be available and applicable on every acre of that farm, at somewhat less; but let us suppose that the first cost of having water everywhere and always at command is $10 per acre, and that it will cost thereafter $1 per acre to apply it, I maintain that it is richly worth having, and that nearly every farm product can be grown cheaper by its help than on lands where irrigation is presumed unnecessary. There are not many acres laid down to gra.s.s in New-England, whether for hay or pasture, that would not have justified an outlay of $10 per acre to secure their thorough irrigation simply for this year alone.

XLV.

SEWAGE.

The great empires of antiquity were doomed to certain decay and dissolution by a radical vice inherent in their political and social const.i.tution. Power rapidly built up a great capital, whereto population was attracted from every quarter; and that capital became a focus of luxury and consumption. Grain, Meat, and Vegetables--the fat of the land and the spoils of the sea--were constantly absorbed by it in enormous quant.i.ties; while nothing, or, at best, very little, was returned therefrom to the continually exhausted and impoverished soil. Thus, a few ages, or at most a few centuries, sufficed to divest a vast surrounding district, first, of its fertility, ultimately of its capacity for production. And so Nineveh, Thebes, Babylon, successively ceased to be capitals, and became ruins amid deserts. Rome impoverished Italy south of the Apennines; then Sicily; and, at last, Egypt: her sceptre finally departing, because her millions could no longer be fed without dispersion.

That some means must be devised whereby to return to the soil those elements which the removal of crop after crop inevitably exhausts, is a truth which has but recently begun to be clearly understood. Unluckily, the difficulty of such restoration is seriously augmented by the fact that cities, and all considerable aggregations of human beings, tend strongly in our day to locations by the sea-side, in valleys, and by the margins of rivers. Anciently, cities and villages were often built on hill-tops, or at considerable elevations, because foes could be excluded or repelled from such locations more surely, and with smaller force, than elsewhere. From such elevations, it need not have been difficult to diffuse, by means of water, all that could be gladly spared which would aid to fertilize the adjacent farms and gardens. A kindred distribution of the exuviae of our modern cities is a far more difficult and costly undertaking, and involves bold and skillful engineering.

Yet the problem, though difficult, must be solved, or our great cities will be destroyed by their own physical impurities. The growth and expansion of cities, throughout the present century, have been wholly beyond precedent; and thus the difficulty of making a satisfactory disposition of their offal has been fearfully augmented. The sewerage of our streets and houses modifies the problem, but does not solve it.

Desolating epidemics, like the Plague, Yellow Fever, and the Cholera, will often visit our great cities, and decimate their people, unless means can be found to cleanse them wholly and incessantly of whatever tends to pollute and render noisome their atmosphere.

SEWAGE is the term used in England to designate water which, having been slightly impregnated with the feculence and ordure of a city or village, is diffused over a farm or farms adjacent, in order to impart at once fertility and moisture to its soil. To secure an equable and thorough dissemination of Sewage, it is essential that the land to which it is applied, if not originally level or nearly so, shall be brought into such condition that the impregnated water may be applied to its entire surface, and shall thence settle into, moisten, and fertilize, each cubic inch of the soil. This involves a very considerable initial outlay; but the luxuriance of the crops unfailingly produced, under the influence of this vivifying irrigation, abundantly justifies and rewards that outlay.

As yet, the application of Sewage is in its infancy; since the perfect and total conversion of all that a great city excretes into the most available food for plants, requires not only immense mains and reservoirs, with a costly network of distributing d.y.k.es or ditches, but novel appliances in engineering, and a large investment of time as well as money. Years must yet elapse before all the excretions of a great city like London or New-York can thus be trans.m.u.ted into the means of fertilizing whole counties in their vicinity. But the work is already well begun, and another generation will see it all but completed.

Meantime, many smaller cities, more eligibly located for the purpose, are already enriching by their Sewage the rural districts adjacent, which they had previously tended strongly to impoverish. Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, is among them. The little village of Romford, England, is one of those which have recently been made to contribute by Sewage to this beneficent end; and a visit of inspection paid to it, on the 15th of October last, by the London Board of Works, elicited accounts of the process and its results, in the London journals, which afforded hints for and incitement to similar undertakings in this and other countries--undertakings which may be postponed, but the only question is one of time. _The Daily News_ of Oct. 17th, says:

"Breton's Farm consists of 121 acres of light and poor gravelly soil; and it now receives the whole available sewage of the town of Romford--that is, of about 7,000 persons. This is conveyed to the land by an iron pipe of 18 inches in diameter, which is laid under ground, and discharges its contents into an open tank. From this tank, the sewage is pumped to a height of 20 feet, and is then distributed over the land by iron or concrete troughs, or 'carriers,' fitted with sluices and taps, so that the amount of sewage applied to any given portion of the field can be regulated with the greatest facility and nicety. To insure the regular and even flow of the sewage when discharged from the carriers, it was necessary to lay out the land with mathematical accuracy; and it has been leveled and formed by the theodolite into rectilinear beds of uniform width of thirty feet, slightly inclining from the centres, along which the sewage is applied. The carriers or open troughs, by which the sewage is conveyed, run along the top of each series of these beds or strikes; and at the bottom there is in every case a good road, by means of which free access is provided for a horse and cart, or for the steam plow--the use of which is in contemplation--to every bed and crop. These arrangements--the carrying out of which involved the removal of six hundred trees and a great length of heavy fences, the filling up of a number of ditches and no less than nine ponds, as well as the complete underdraining of the whole farm--were mainly effected last year; but it was not until the middle of April, 1870, that Mr. Hope received any of this sewage from the town of Romford, and not until the following month that he obtained both the day and night supply. Satisfactory, therefore, as have been the results of the present season's operations, they have been obtained under disadvantageous circ.u.mstances, and cannot be regarded as affording complete evidence of the benefits which may be derived from the application of sewage to even a poor and thin soil, which had already ruined more than one of those who had attempted to cultivate it. To mention only one drawback which arose from the lateness of the period at which the sewage was first received, Mr. Hope had not the advantage of being able to apply it to his seed-beds: and thus many, if not all his plants were not ready for setting out so early as they would be in a future year, and some of the crops have suffered in consequence--that is to say, have suffered in a comparative sense. Speaking positively, they have in all instances been much larger, not only than any that could have been grown upon the same land without the use of sewage, but than any which have been raised from much superior land in the immediate neighborhood. The crops which have been or are being raised on different parts of the firm, are of diverse character; but, with all, the method of cultivation adopted has been attended with almost equal success.

Italian rye-gra.s.s, beans, peas, mangolds, carrots, broccoli, cabbages, savoys, beet-root, Batavia yams, Jersey cabbages, and Indian corn, have all grown with wonderful rapidity and yielded abundant harvests under the stimulating and nouris.h.i.+ng influence of the Romford sewage. The visitors of Sat.u.r.day last, as they tramped over the farm under the guidance of its energetic proprietor, had an opportunity of witnessing the abundance and excellence of many of these crops. Even where the mangolds, from being planted late, had not attained any extraordinary size, it was noticeable that the plants were especially vigorous, and that there was not a vacant s.p.a.ce in any of the rows. All the plants which had been placed in the ground had thriven, and would give a good return. Where this crop had been specially treated with a view to forthcoming shows, the roots had attained an enormous size, and, like some of the cabbages, had a.s.sumed almost gigantic proportions. The carrots were very fine and well-grown, and the heads of the Walcheren broccoli were as white, and firm, and crispy, as the finest cauliflowers; while the savoys, of unusual size and weight, were as round and hard as cannon b.a.l.l.s; and some of the drumhead cabbages, although equally distinguished for closeness and firmness, were large enough in the heart to hold a good-sized child, and might, as was suggested upon the ground, very well be introduced into some pantomimic scene representing the kingdom of Brobdingnag. The Indian corn had reached the respectable height of some eight feet, and, with few exceptions, each stalk carried a good-sized and well-filled cob or ear.

These, unless we should have another spell of exceptionally hot weather, will not ripen; but in their green state they are readily eaten by horses and cattle, and prove excellent fodder.

In the course of their peregrinations, Mr. Hope's guests of course paid a visit to the tank in which the sewage is received before it is pumped on the land. We need hardly say that the appearance of this miniature lake of nastiness was anything but agreeable; but its odor was by no means overpowering, nor, indeed, very offensive. The rill of bright, clear water which flowed in at one corner, and some of which was handed about in tumblers, looking as pure as the limpid stream which flows from the most effective filters that are to be seen in the windows of London dealers, had only a short time before flowed out of this hideous reservoir in a very different state. We had met it in the "carriers"

flowing along in a dark, inky stream, not smelling much, but covered with an ugly gray froth which reminded one of some of the most disagreeable details in the manufacture of sugar and rum, or suggested the idea that it had been used for a very foul wash indeed. With these reminiscences fresh in one's memory, it required some courage to comply with the pressing invitations to taste this 'effluent water.' There were, however, many of the party who braved the attempt; and, by all who tasted it, the water was p.r.o.nounced to be dest.i.tute of any except a slightly mineral flavor. In dry weather, this effluent water, which has pa.s.sed through the land and been collected by the drains, after mixing with the sewage, is again pumped over the fields; in wet weather, it can be turned into the brook which is dignified with the name of the river Rom. * * * We have omitted to mention that the rent paid by Mr. Hope is 3 per acre, and the cost of the sewage (at 2s. per head) 6 more."

--I think few thoughtful readers will doubt that here is the germ of a great movement in advance for the Agriculture of all old and densely peopled communities, and that our youngest cities and manufacturing villages may wisely consider it deeply, with a view to its ultimate if not early imitation. That we are not prepared to incur the inevitable expense of a thorough system of sewerage with reference to the application to the soil of all the fertilizing elements that a city would gladly spare, by no means proves that we should not consider and plan with a view to the ultimate creation and utilization of Sewage.

XLVI.

MORE OF IRRIGATION.

I have thus far considered Irrigation with special reference to those limited, yet very considerable districts, which are traversed or bordered by living streams, and, having a level or slightly rolling surface, present obvious facilities for and incitements to the operation. Such are the valleys of the Platte, and of nearly or quite all its affluents after they leave the Rocky Mountains; such is the valley of the upper Arkansas; such the valleys of the Smoky Hill and the Republican, so far down as Irrigation may be considered necessary.

Irrigation on all these seems to me inevitable, and certain to be speedily, though capriciously, effected.

I believe a dam across either fork of the Platte, at any favorable point above their junction, raising the surface of the stream six feet, at a cost not exceeding $10,000, would suffice to irrigate completely not less than fifty square miles of the valley below it, while serving at the same time to furnish power for mills and factories to a very considerable extent; for the need of Irrigation is not incessant, but generally confined to two or three months per annum, and all of the volume of the stream not needed for Irrigation could be utilized as power. Thus the valleys of the few constant water-courses of the Plains may come at an early day to employ and subsist a dense and energetic population, engaged in the successful prosecution alike of agriculture and manufactures, while belts, groves, and forests, of choice, luxuriant timber, will diversify and embellish regions now bare of trees, and but thinly covered with dead herbage from June until the following April.

But, when we rise above the bluffs, and look off across the blank, bleak areas where no living water exists, the problem becomes more difficult, and its solution will doubtless be much longer postponed. To a stranger, these bleak uplands seem sterile; and, though such is not generally the fact, the presumption will repel experiments which involve a large initial outlay. The railroad companies, which now own large tracts of these lands, will be obliged either to demonstrate their value, or to incite individuals and colonists to do it by liberal concessions. As the case stands to-day, most of these lands, which would have been dear at five cents per acre before the roads were built, could not be sold at any price to actual settlers, even with the railroad in plain sight, because of the dearth of fuel and timber, and because also the means of rendering them fruitful and their cultivation profitable are out of reach of the ordinary pioneer. Hence, so long as the valleys of the living streams proffer such obvious invitations to settlement and tillage, by the aid of Irrigation, I judge that the higher and dryer plains will mainly be left to the half-savage herdsmen who rear cattle and sheep without feeding and sheltering them, by giving them the range of a quarter-section to each bullock, and submitting to the loss of a hundred head or so after each great and cold snow-storm, as an unavoidable dispensation of Providence.

But in process of time even the wild herdsmen will be softened into or replaced by regular farmers, plowing and seeding for vegetables and small grains, sheltering their habitations with trees, and sending their children to school. This change involves Irrigation; and the following are among the ways in which it will be effected:

The Plains are nowhere absolutely flat (as I presume the "desert" of Sahara is not), but diversified by slopes, and swells, and gentle ridges or divides, affording abundant facilities for the distribution of water.

A well, sunk on the crest of one of these divides, will be filled with living water at a depth ranging from 50 to 100 feet. A windmill of modest dimensions placed over this well will be rarely stopped for want of impelling power: Wind being, next to s.p.a.ce, the thing most abundant on the Plains. A reservoir or pond covering three or four acres may be made adjacent to the well at a small cost of labor, by excavating slightly and using the earth to form an embankment on the lower side.

The windmill, left alone, will fill the reservoir during the windy Winter and Spring months with water soon warmed in the sun, and ready to be drawn off as wanted throughout the thirsty season of vegetable growth and maturity. Carefully saved, the product of one well will serve to moisten and vivify a good many acres of gra.s.s or tillage.

Such is the retail plan applicable to the wants of solitary farmers; but I hope to see it supplemented and invigorated by the extensive introduction of Artesian wells, whereof two, by way of experiment, are now in progress at Denver and Kit Carson respectively.

I need not here describe the Artesian well, farther than to say that it is made by boring to a depth ranging from 700 to more than a 1000 feet, tubing regularly from the top downward until a stream is reached which will rise to and above the surface, flowing over the top of the tube in a stream often as large as an average stove-pipe. Such a well, after supplying a settlement or modest village with water, may be made to fill a reservoir that will sufficiently irrigate a thousand cultivated acres.

Its water will usually be warmer than though obtained from near the surface, and hence better adapted to Irrigation.

Of course, the Artesian well is costly, and will not soon be constructed for uses purely agricultural; but the railroads traversing the Plains and the Great Basin will sometimes be compelled to resort to one without having use for a twentieth part of the water they thus entice from the bowels of the earth; and that which they cannot use they will be glad to sell for a moderate price, thus creating oases of verdure and bounteous production. The palpable interest of railroads in dotting their long lines of desolation with such cheering contrasts of field and meadow and waving trees, render nowise doubtful their hearty cooperation with any enterprising pioneer who shall bring the requisite capital, energy, knowledge, and faith, to the prosecution of the work.

These are but hasty suggestions of methods which will doubtless be multiplied, varied, and improved upon, in the light of future experience and study. And when the very best and most effective methods of subduing the Plains to the uses of civilized man shall have been discovered and adopted, there will still remain vast areas as free commons for the herdsmen and sporting-grounds for the hunter of the Elk and the Antelope, after the Buffalo shall have utterly disappeared.

I do not doubt the a.s.sertion of the plainsmen that rain increases as settlements are multiplied. Crossing the Plains in 1859, I noted indications that timber had formerly abounded where none now grows; and I presume that, as young trees are multiplied in the wake of civilization, finally thickening into clumps of timber and beginning a forest, more rain will fall, and the extension of woodlands become comparatively easy. But, relatively to the country eastward of the Missouri, the Plains will always be arid and thirsty, with a pure, bracing atmosphere that will form a chief attraction to thousands suffering from or threatened with pulmonary afflictions. A million of square miles, whereon is found no single swamp or bog, and not one lake that withstands the drouth of Summer, can never have a moist climate, and never fail to realize the need of Irrigation.

The Plains will in time give lessons, which even the well-watered and verdurous East may read with profit. Such level and thirsty clays as largely border Lake Champlain, for example, traversed by streams from mountain ranges on either hand, will not always be owned and cultivated by men insensible to the profit of Irrigation. Nor will such rich valleys as those of the Connecticut, the Kennebec, the Susquehanna, be left to suffer year after year from drouth, while the water which should refresh them runs idly and uselessly by. Agriculture repels innovation, and loves the beaten track; but such lessons as New-England has received in the great drouth of 1870 will not always be given and endured in vain.

XLVII.

UNDEVELOPED SOURCES OF POWER.

The more I consider the present state of our Agriculture, the more emphatic is my discontent with the farmer's present sources and command of power. The subjugation and tillage of a farm, like the running of a factory or furnace, involves a continual use of Power; but the manufacturer obtains his from sources which supply it cheaply and in great abundance, while the farmer has been content with an inferior article, in limited supply, at a far heavier cost. Yet the stream which turns the factory's wheels and sets all its machinery in motion traverses or skirts many farms as well, and, if properly harnessed, is just as ready to speed the plow as to impel the shuttles of a woolen-mill, or revolve the cylinders of a calico-printery. Nature is impartially kind to all her children; but some of them know how to profit by her good-will far more than others. No doubt, we all have much yet to learn, and our grandchildren will marvel at the proofs of stupidity evinced in our highest achievements; but I am not mistaken in a.s.serting that, as yet, the farmers' control of Nature's free gifts of power is very far inferior to that of nearly every other cla.s.s of producers.