The Twin Falls times. [volume] (Twin Falls, Idaho) 1905-1916, 1910-09-01

tensive crops. Flowing need not be
done so deep at first and on some soils
shallow blowing may give better re-
suits than deep blowing. More atten-
ton needs to be given to leveling and
smoothing the land where irrigation is
practiced. The right kind of land pre-
paration is permanent Improvement
which pays from the first because it
saves much future expense and trOu-
BILE. Irrigation farming is a new ag-
riculture" in the west, and man
needs to know it in order to meet with
the success which should crown his
efforts. On the same soils and under
the same conditions the man who
knows how will get fifty bushels of
wheat while the one who does not will
get twenty-five bushels. Right Gull
ture will give one man 300 sacks of
potatoes per acre and wrong culture
another man so sacks per acre. There
is a considerable profit to the man
who gets 800 sacks of potatoes if he
uses $4,000 expense per acre to raise
the crops, over the man who gets so
sacks by an expense of $500 per
acre. One man nets $1S5.00 per acre
and the other makes $3.50 per acre
The man with the large yield probably
works only forty-acre farm, and
from twenty acres of it in potatoes
banks $3,700.00 for that crop. The sec
ond man is probably trying to farm
eighty acres, and from forty acres in
potatoes he banks 100000. The little
farm we'll titled has brought it's owner
over four hundred per cent the largest
net income. The point made is that
good tillage for irrigation means thor
ough tillage and special systems OF
soil and crop management to produce
the best returns.
Fertility is measured by the power
of soil to produce crops. AS we have
shown, moisture is an essential ele-
ment of fertility Other elements are
nitrogen and minerals which are di-
rect plant foods. In much of the irri-
gated region the waters used contain
large amounts of dissolved fertilizing
elements. It has been shown that
waters which contain much silt carry
with them large amounts of dissolved
plant foods. Studies of the waters used
in irrigation from the Rio Grande river
showed that where water was used to
the depth of one foot it deposited 955
pounds of potassium. SO pounds of
phosphoric acid, and So pounds of nj
trogen to each acre. This would be a
sufficient supply of nitrogen for more
than thirty bushels of wheat per acre,
enough phosphoric acid for thirty
bushels per acre, and enough potas-
SUM to last for thirty years. is as
much wheat was raised on the land
each year. Such large amounts of soil
fertility are unusual, however but
even our clear waters from mountain
streams carry with them consider
able amount of silt and plant food in
the late spring and early summer. I'm
der irrigation such large annual crops
are taken off the soil that the subject
of available plant food becomes an i'm
portant one. Our soils will wear out
unless a good farm practice is inau-
gurated which will keep them pro-
ductive. With proper system of ro-
tation and cropping, adding plant food
to the soil in the form of barnyard
manure, the waste of feed pens, green
manure and growing of leguminous
crops will keep the soils always rich
ly productive. Only in special loca-
lions or with special crops will the
use of artificial fertilizer be found adj
visable.
There has been much useless alarm
about alkali. Our soils are very rich