Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1897-01-21

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NI.sgSslAaEzaIiY YSs ! = been. shown in many
parts of California, where the rainfall
is ample for almost all crops, and the
farmer can raise more to the acre with
out irrigation than in almost any part
of the east. In these sections it has been
found, as it was long ago in Italy, that
whatever you may do without lrrlga-
tion can be SO far surpassed with it
that no one can afford to dispense with
it where it can be easily had. The re-
clamation of west Kansas and Nebras-
ka from the almost hopeless desert of
few years ago means far more than the
people imagine. 1t is not only shown
that there is no such thing as desert
where water is near enough to the sur
face to be raised with a windmill or
other cheap power, but is proving what
If long since proved in California-that
irrigation makes small holdings with
condensed and lively settlement, while
farming on the rainfall alone makes
large holdings with slow and sleepy
neighborhoods. Under irrigation, al
most everyone who has over forty
acres wants to sell land and have more
neighbors; without it, nearly everyone
who does not want to sell out to leave
the country wants to buy out his neigh
Dor, if in a condition to do so.
To make success of irrigation it by
no means follows that water should be
available for all the land or even half
of it. The meanest country to farm
without irrigation is the country that
on the rainfall will yield a good crop in
about four years out of ten, half a crop
IN two more, and a quarter OF crop
In the other two. California has some
of this and it is worse than the Colo
rado desert, because it will toy with a
mans hopes for years and play him the
same trick at last that the desert will
do In one season. But if the owner of
a quarter section of it can irrigate five
acres the ca Sc is vastly different. His
living is assured and in dry seasons he
can work the dry ground to its full
capacity. With five acres of wet land
and seventy.fve of dry, the farmer is
richer than he would be with a thous-
and of dry with no wet land attached
to it. 1t would take the thousand of
dry land several years longer to close
out than it would eighty of dry land,
but the outcome would be just as GER
tain. But with the small tract of wet
land to carry him, neither time nor fate
can drive him from the place if he is as
industrious and economical as every
one should be who expects to make a
living from the soil. This is seen in
many parts of California where two or
three sets of settlers have been sue
cessively driven out. And some of the
most prosperous settlements, where
they now brag the most about their
water advantages, are those where but
few years ago ''no irrigation requir-
ed was the most conspicuous part of
their advertisements.
AS the ''no irrigation required" peo-
pie learned their folly by seeing the sue
cess of near neighbors, so will western
Kansas and Nebraska be object lessons
to the eastern portion of these states.
There are thousands of places in the
most rainy sections of the east where
they can no more afford to ignore irri-
cation (where it can be had at reasona-
bic expense) than they can in Los Ange-
les and Orange counties in California.
where the uplands will raise without
any irrigation better average crop of
corn than any part of Illinois and where
the damp lands will beat their best.
These lands will do it because there is
never any loss from too much rain,
while the very dry seasons are not as
frequent as in Ohio and New York.
But in those very sections water brings
the highest price for irrigation In the
United States. This is not because