Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 March 1887 — Irrigating Canals. [ARTICLE]

Irrigating Canals.

A great obstacle in many sections of our country to successful cultivation is the insufficient rainfall. To remove this obstacle it is only necessary that a system of irrigation be adopted. To irr.gato successfully requires a large amount of technical knowledge and skill and the expenditure of much labor and money. Irrigation belongs, in fact, to progressive agriculture, and pays best when applied to valuable land by intelligent men. Under such circumstances it pays for itself many times over by rendering large tracts of land otherwise yalue’ess highly productive. In proof of this assertion are many successful efforts with irrigation in our own country. A-notable instance at hand is the State of Colorado, with its 800 miles of first-class irrigating canals, 3,500 miles of secondary canals, and 40,000 miles, of smaller ditches, which have cost in the aggregate about sll,000,000, and will irrigate acres. The largest canal is taken from the Bio del Norte. It is ninety-eight feet wide at the top and sixty-five feet on the bottom, with a carrying capacity of 207,000,00) cubic feet per diem. The main line is forty miles long, and it is designed to irrigate 200,000 acres. It was constructed in four months by 5,000 men and 1,200 teams.