The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1895-04-16
Robert Hay on Subsoiijng.

! From the Kansas City Gazette.
Every farmer who cares to get out
| of the old hit or miss way of farming
only the upper three inches of his farm,
should study Prof. Robert Hays excel
lent paper on Sub-soiling and Irriga-
ton in today's Gazette.
When we began some months ago to
write about subsoiling, and when we
orally recommended il a dozen years
ago, it was often sneered at. Now hun
dreds of Kansas trainers are trying it,
and all through the winter many news
papers copied and commented on our
articles, but their approval altogether
hardly weighs as much as Prof. Hays
weighty words. especially those with
which he closes. Yet even these We
must criticise. He says: In western
Kansas irrigation from wells must pre-
dominate" On the uplands of West
ern Kansas wells are usually too deep
and have too little water for printable
irrigation. The creeks, however. flow
underground in shallow ravineS and the
water can be drawn off by a covered
fiume, which slopes but fifth or a
tenth as much as the underfiow itself.
To pump water from this is not neces-
sary, and to pump it from bored wells
is too costly and too small in quantity
for corn or other grain. But even here
we reiterate the title of our first article
on sub-soiling: Better than Irrigat-
ion"
Prof. Hays assertion that two feet
deep of water is required TO raise crop
of corn is not universally true. When
ground is plowed only four inches deep
three feet of water may be sufficient.
But half that much held in the long cav
tiles made by mole plough in the i'm
perviOuS Sub-soil. Will raise good crop
We, therefore, think it better not to
try to irrigate for corn in most OF the
uplands i'm western Kansas.
In middle Kansas he advises i'm
pounding water in dams. But damn
the dams" say our MissouTian friends
southeast Of us. where they have TO
catch water in dams for their cattle,
IF saving drinking water is 50 trouble
some. how much more so VIII be i'm
pounding enough 10 irrigate largely in
the dry climate Of the plains?
In eastern Kansas he says to put the
dams in the ravines. But floods wash
them out oftener than not; and ii is
hard to carry water from the ravines
TO the fields. a big irrigating often
costs much less relatively than a small
ditch or pipe from such a dam. When
3 all practicable such dams viii do 70
water a few acres Of creek bottoms.
but il is usually easier and cheaper 70
utilize streams which now run 70 waste
can be irrigated at small cost per acre
from Kansas Falls on the Smoky Hi
river. ten miles from it's mouth.
The professors warning not 70 SUBJ
soil in leaky ground IS not needed. I
Even sand viii hold the water Of an
ordinary rain. like "a sponge, su y can
not stream over the surface as in shall (
low plouEhing. and 50 suDeTsaturate
the soil. till Il leaks out below Leaky
land is very rare and would be tho last
to he so0-soil-ploughed D. sensible
farmers.
What Prof Hay says az storing wa 4
ter in the sub-sol from Il wet 70 dry 4
year goes FAR beyond anything we ever /
said. We said the spring rains could I
he 50 held for two o. three months and .
little q the rarer summer rains lost. f
This would insure corn crop any
: ear and q big crop most years sun
K may be possible that some moisture .
could be saved til next year IN the 4
most unmi-=sted g1Ebo land.