So far as tile drains are concerned, if they are once well laid, and if the silt-basins have been emptied of silt until the water has ceased to deposit it, they need no care nor attention, beyond an occasional cleaning of the outlet brook. Now and then, from the proximity of willows, or thrifty, young, water-loving trees, a drain will be obstructed by roots; or, during the first few years after the work is finished, some weak point,—a badly laid tile, a loosely fitted connection between the lateral and a main, or an accumulation of silt coming from an undetected and persistent vein of quicksand,—will be developed, and repairs will have to be made. Except for the slight danger from roots, which must always be guarded against to the extent of allowing no young trees of the dangerous class to grow near a drain through which a constant stream of water flows, it may be fairly assumed that drains which have been kept in order for four or five years have passed the danger of interruption from any cause, and they may be considered entirely safe.
A drain will often, for some months after it is laid, run muddy water after rains. Sometimes the early deposit of silt will nearly fill the tile, and it will take the water of[pg 145] several storms to wash it out. If the tiles have been laid in packed clay, they cannot long receive silt from without, and that which makes the flow turbid, may be assumed to come from the original deposit in the conduit. Examinations of newly laid drains have developed many instances where tiles were at first half filled with silt, and three months later were entirely clean. The muddiness of the flow indicates what the doctors call "an effort of nature to relieve herself," and nature may be trusted to succeed, at least, until she abandons the effort. If we are sure that a drain has been well laid, we need feel no anxiety because it fails to take the water from the ground so completely as it should do, until it settles into a flow of clear water after the heaviest storms.
In the case of art actual stoppage, which will generally be indicated by the "bursting out" of the drain, i.e., the wetting of the land as though there were a spring under it, or as though its water had no underground outlet, (which is the fact,) it will be necessary to lay open the drain until the obstruction is found.
In this work, the real value of the map will be shown, by the facility which it offers for finding any point of any line of drains, and the exact locality of the junctions with the mains, and of the silt-basins. In laying out the plan on the ground, and in making his map, the surveyor will have had recourse to two or more fixed points; one of them, in our example, (fig. 21,) would probably be the center of the main silt-basin, and one, a drilled hole or other mark on the rock at the north side of the field. By staking out on the ground the straight line connecting these two points, and drawing a corresponding line on the map; we shall have a base-line, from which it will be easy, by perpendicular offsets, to determine on the ground any point upon the map. By laying a small square on the map, with one of its edges coinciding with the base-line, and moving it on this line until the other edge meets the[pg 146] desired point, we fix, at the angle of the square, the point on the base-line from which we are to measure the length of the offset. The next step is to find, (by the scale,) the distance of this point from the nearest end of the base-line, and from the point sought. Then measure off, in the field, the corresponding distance on the base-line, and, from the point thus found, measure on a line perpendicular to the base line, the length of the offset; the point thus indicated will be the locality sought. In the same manner, find another point on the same drain, to give the range on which to stake it out. From this line, the drains which run parallel to it, can easily be found, or it may be used as a base-line, from which to find, by measuring offsets, other points near it.
The object of this staking is, to find, in an inexpensive and easy way, the precise position of the drains, for which it would be otherwise necessary to grope in the dark, verifying our guesses by digging four-foot trenches, at random.
If there is a silt-basin, or a junction a short distance below the point where the water shows itself, this will be the best place to dig. If it is a silt-basin, we shall probably find that this has filled up with dirt, and has stopped the flow. In this case it should be cleaned out, and a point of the drain ten feet below it examined. If this is found to be clear, a long slender stick may be pushed up as far as the basin and worked back and forth until the passage is cleared. Then replace the tile below, and try with the stick to clean the tiles above the basin, so as to tap the water above the obstruction. If this cannot be done, or if the drain ten feet below is clogged, it will be necessary to uncover the tiles in both directions until an opening is found, and to take up and relay the whole. If the wetting of the ground is sufficient to indicate that there is much water in the drain, only five or six tiles should be taken up at a time, cleaned and relaid,—commencing at[pg 147] the lower end,—in order that, when the water commences to flow, it may not disturb the bottom of the ditch for the whole distance.
If the point opened is at a junction with the main, examine both the main and the lateral, to see which is stopped, and proceed with one or the other, as directed above. In doing this work, care should be taken to send as little muddy water as possible into the drain below, and to allow the least possible disturbance of the bottom.
If silt-basins have been placed at those points at which the fall diminishes, the obstruction will usually be found to occur at the outlets of these, from a piling up of the silt in front of them, and to extend only a short distance below and above. It is not necessary to take up the tiles until they are found to be entirely clean, for, if they are only one-half or one-third full, they will probably be washed clean by the rush of water, when that which is accumulated above is tapped. The work should be done in settled fair weather, and the ditches should remain open until the effect of the flow has been observed. If the tiles are made thoroughly clean by the time that the accumulated water has run off, say in 24 hours, they may be covered up; if not, it may be necessary to remove them again, and clean them by hand. When the work is undertaken it should be thoroughly done, so that the expense of a new opening need not be again incurred.
It is worse than useless to substitute larger sizes of tiles for those which are taken up. The obstruction, if by silt, is the result of a too sluggish flow, and to enlarge the area of the conduit would only increase the difficulty. If the tiles are too small to carry the full flow which follows a heavy rain, they will be very unlikely to become choked, for the water will then have sufficient force to wash them clean, while if they are much larger than necessary, a deposit of silt to one half of their height will make a broad,[pg 148] flat bed for the stream, which will run with much less force, and will be more likely to increase the deposit.
If the drains are obstructed by the roots of willows, or other trees, the proprietor must decide whether he will sacrifice the trees or the drains; both he cannot keep, unless he chooses to go to the expense of laying in cement all of the drains which carry constant streams, for a distance of at least 50 feet from the dangerous trees. The trouble from trees is occasionally very great, but its occurrence is too rare for general consideration, and must be met in each case with such remedies as circumstances suggest as the best.
The gratings over the outlets of silt-basins which open at the surface of the ground, are sometimes, during the first year of the drainage, obstructed by a fungoid growth which collects on the cross bars. This should be occasionally rubbed off. Its character is not very well understood, and it is rarely observed in old drains. The decomposition of the grass bands which are used to cover the joints of the larger tiles may encourage its formation.
If the surface soil have a good proportion of sand, gravel, or organic matter, so as to give it the consistency which is known as "loamy," it will bear any treatment which it may chance to receive in cultivation, or as pasture land; but if it be a decided clay soil, no amount of draining will enable us to work it, or to turn cattle upon it when it is wet with recent rains. It will much sooner become dry, because of the drainage, and may much sooner be trodden upon without injury; but wet clay cannot be worked or walked over without being more or less puddled, and, thereby, injured for a long time.
No matter how thoroughly heavy clay pasture lands may be under-drained, the cattle should be removed from them when it rains, and kept off until they are comparatively dry. Neglect of this precaution has probably led[pg 149] to more disappointment as to the effects of drainage than any other circumstances connected with it. The injury from this cause does not extend to a great depth, and in the Northern States it would always be overcome by the frosts of a single winter; as has been before stated, it is confined to stiff clay soils, but as these are the soils which most need draining, the warning given is important.
Draining is expensive work. This fact must be accepted as a very stubborn one, by every man who proposes to undertake the improvement. There is no royal road to tile-laying, and the beginner should count the cost at the outset. A good many acres of virgin land at the West might be bought for what must be paid to get an efficient system of drains laid under a single acre at home. Any man who stops at this point of the argument will probably move West,—or do nothing.
Yet, it is susceptible of demonstration that, even at the West, in those localities where Indian Corn is worth as much as fifty cents per bushel at the farm, it will pay to drain, in the best manner, all such land as is described in the first chapter of this book as in need of draining. Arguments to prove this need not be based at all on cheapness of the work; only on its effects and its permanence.
In fact, so far as draining with tiles is concerned, cheapness is a delusion and a snare, for the reason that it implies something less than the best work, a compromise between excellence and inferiority. The moment that we come down from the best standard, we introduce a new element into the calculation. The sort of tile draining which it is the purpose of this work to advocate is a system so complete[pg 151] in every particular, that it may be considered as an absolutely permanent improvement. During the first years of the working of the drains, they will require more or less attention, and some expense for repairs; but, in well constructed work, these will be very slight, and will soon cease altogether. In proportion as we resort to cheap devices, which imply a neglect of important parts of the work, and a want of thoroughness in the whole, the expense for repairs will increase, and the duration of the usefulness of the drains will diminish.
Drains which are permanently well made, and which will, practically, last for all time, may be regarded as a good investment, the increased crop of each year, paying a good interest on the money that they cost, and the money being still represented by the undiminished value of the improvement. In such a case the draining of the land may be said to cost, not $50 per acre,—but the interest on $50 each year. The original amount is well invested, and brings its yearly dividend as surely as though it were represented by a five-twenty bond.
With badly constructed drains, on the other hand, the case is quite different. In buying land which is subject to no loss in quantity or quality, the farmer considers, not so much the actual cost, as the relation between the yearly interest on the cost, and the yearly profit on the crop,—knowing that, a hundred years hence, the land will still be worth his money.
But if the land were bounded on one side by a river which yearly encroached some feet on its bank, leaving the field a little smaller after each freshet; or if, every spring, some rods square of its surface were sure to be covered three feet deep with stones and sand, so that the actual value of the property became every year less, the purchaser would compare the yearly value of the crops, not only with the interest on the price, but, in addition to this, with so much[pg 152] of the prime value as yearly disappears with the destruction of the land.
It is exactly so with the question of the cost of drainage. If the work is insecurely done, and is liable, in five years or in fifty, to become worthless; the increase of the crops resulting from it, must not only cover the yearly interest on the cost, but the yearly depreciation as well. Therefore what may seem at the time of doing the work to be cheapness, is really the greatest extravagance. It is like building a brick wall with clay for mortar. The bricks and the workmanship cost full price, and the small saving on the mortar will topple the wall over in a few years, while, if well cemented, it would have lasted for centuries. The cutting and filling of the ditches, and the purchase and transportation of the tiles, will cost the same in every case, and these constitute the chief cost; if the proper care in grading, tile-laying and covering, and in making outlets be stingily withheld,—saving, perhaps, one-tenth of the expense,—what might have been a permanent improvement to the land, may disappear, and the whole outlay be lost in ten years. A saving of ten per cent. in the cost will have lost us the other ninety in a short time.
But, while cheapness is to be shunned, economy is to be sought in every item of the work of draining, and should be studied, by proprietor and engineer, from the first examination of the land, to the throwing of the last shovelful of earth on to the filling of the ditch. There are few operations connected with the cultivation of the soil in which so much may be imperceptibly lost through neglect, and carelessness about little details, as in tile-draining. In the original levelling of the ground, the adjustment of the lines, the establishing of the most judicious depth and inclination at each point of the drains, the disposition of surface streams during the prosecution of the work, and in the width of the excavation, the line which divides economy and wastefulness is extremely narrow and the[pg 153] most constant vigilance, together with the best judgment and foresight, are needed to avoid unnecessary cost. In the laying and covering of the tile, on the other hand, it is best to disregard a little slowness and unnecessary care on the part of the workmen, for the sake of the most perfect security of the work.
Details of Cost.—The items of the work of drainage may be classified as follows:
1. Engineering and Superintendence.
2. Digging the ditches.
3. Grading the bottoms.
4. Tile and tile-laying.
5. Covering the tile and filling the ditches.
6. Outlets and silt-basins.
1. Engineering and Superintendence.—It is not easy to say what would be the proper charge for this item of the work. In England, the Commissioners under the Drainage Acts of Parliament, and the Boards of Public Works, fix the charge for engineering at $1.25 per acre. That is in a country when the extent of lands undergoing the process of draining is very great, enabling one person to superintend large tracts in the same neighborhood at the same time, and with little or no outlay for travelling expenses. In this country, where the improvement is, thus far, confined to small areas, widely separated; and where there are comparatively few engineers who make a specialty of the work, the charge for services is necessarily much higher, and the amount expended in travelling much greater. In most cases, the proprietor of the land must qualify himself to superintend his own operations, (with the aid of a country surveyor, or a railroad engineer in the necessary instrumental work.) As draining becomes more general, the demand for professional assistance will, without doubt, cause local engineers to turn their attention to the subject, and their services may be more cheaply obtained. At present, it would probably not be prudent to[pg 154] estimate the cost of engineering and superintendence, including the time and skill of the proprietor, at less than $5 per acre, even where from 20 to 50 acres are to be drained at once.
2. Digging the Ditches.—The labor required for the various operations constitutes the principal item of cost in draining, and the price of labor is now so different in different localities, and so unsettled in all, that it is difficult to determine a rate which would be generally fair. It will be assumed that the average wages of day laborers of the class employed in digging ditches, is $1.50 per day, and the calculation will have to be changed for different districts, in proportion to the deviation of the actual rate of wages from this amount. There is a considerable advantage in having the work done at some season, (as after the summer harvest, or late in the fall,) when wages are comparatively low.
The cutting of the ditches should always be let by the rod. When working at day's work, the men will invariably open them wider than is necessary, for the sake of the greater convenience of working, and the extra width causes a corresponding waste of labor.
A 4-foot ditch, in most soils, need be only 20 inches wide at the surface, and 4 inches at the bottom. This gives a mean width of 12 inches, and requires the removal of nearly 2-1/2 cubic yards of earth for each rod of ditch; but an increase to a mean width of 16 inches, (which day workmen will usually reach, while piece workmen almost never will,) requires the removal of 3-1/4 cubic yards to the rod. As the increased width is usually below the middle of the drain, the extra earth will all have to be raised from 2 to 4 feet, and the extra 3/4 yards will cost as much as a full yard taken evenly from the whole side, from top to bottom.
In clay soils, free from stones or "hard pan," but so stiff as to require considerable picking, ordinary workmen,[pg 155] after a little practice, will be able to dig 3-1/2 rods of ditch per day, to an average depth of 3.80,—leaving from 2 to 3 inches of the bottom of 4-foot ditches to be finished by the graders. This makes the cost of digging about 43 cents per rod. In loamy soil the cost will be a little less than this, and in very hard ground, a little more. In sandy and peaty soils, the cost will not be more than 30 cents. Probably 43 cents would be a fair average for soils requiring drainage, throughout the country.
This is about 17 cents for each yard of earth removed.
In soft ground, the caving in of the banks will require a much greater mean width than 12 inches to be thrown out, and, if the accident could not have been prevented by ordinary care on the part of the workman, (using the bracing boards shown in Fig. 28,) he should receive extra pay for the extra work. In passing around large stones it may also be necessary to increase the width.
The following table will facilitate the calculations for such extra work:
| CUBIC YARDS OF EXCAVATION IN DITCHES OF VARIOUS WIDTH. | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Length of Ditch. | 12 Inches Wide. | 18 Inches Wide. | 24 Inches Wide. | 30 Inches Wide. | 36 Inches Wide. |
| Yds. Feet. | Yds. Feet. | Yds. Feet. | Yds. Feet. | Yds. Feet. | |
| 1 Yard. | 0 12 | 0 18 | 0 24 | 1 3 | 1 9 |
| 1 Rod. | 2 12 | 3 18 | 4 24 | 6 3 | 7 9 |
Men will, in most soils, work best in couples,—one shovelling out the earth, and working forward, and the other, (moving backward,) loosening the earth with a spade or foot-pick, (Fig. 41.) In stony land, the men should be required to keep their work well closed up,—excavating to the full depth as they go. Then, if they strike a stone too large to be taken out within the terms of their contract, they can skip a sufficient distance to pass it, and the digging of the omitted part may be done by a faithful day workman. This will usually be cheaper and more satisfactory than to pay the contractors for extra work.
[pg 156]Concerning the amount of work that one man can do in a day, in different soils, digging ditches 4 feet deep, French says: "In the writer's own field, where the pick was used to loosen the lower two feet of earth, the labor of opening and filling drains 4 feet deep, and of the mean width of 14 inches, all by hand labor, has been, in a mile of drains, being our first experiments, about one day's labor to 3 rods in length. The excavated earth of such a drain measures not quite 3 cubic yards, (exactly, 2.85.)" In a subsequent work, in a sandy soil, two men opened, laid, and refilled 14 rods in one day;—the mean width being 12 inches.21
"In the same season, the same men opened, laid, and filled 70 rods of 4-foot drain of the same mean width of 12 inches, in the worst kind of clay soil, where the pick was constantly used. It cost 35 days' labor to complete the job, being 50 cents per rod for the labor alone." Or, under the foregoing calculation of $1.50 per day, 75 cents per rod. These estimates, in common with nearly all that are published, are for the entire work of digging, grading, tile-laying, and refilling. Deducting the time required for the other work, the result will be about as above estimated; for the rough excavation, 3 1/2-rods to the day's work, costing, at $1.50 per day, 43 cents to the rod.
Grading is the removal of 2 or 3 inches in depth, and about 4 inches in width, of the soil at the bottom of the ditch. It is chiefly done with the finishing scoop, which, (being made of two thin plates, one of iron and one of steel, welded together, the iron wearing away and leaving[pg 157] the sharp steel edge always prominent,) will work in a very hard clay without the aid of the pick. Three men,—the one in the ditch being a skillful workman, and the others helping him when not sighting the rods,—will grade about 100 rods per day, making the cost about 6 cents per rod. Until they acquire the skill to work thus rapidly, they should not be urged beyond what they can readily do in the best manner, as this operation, (which is the preparing of the foundation for the tiles,) is probably the most important of the whole work of draining.
Tiles and Tile-Laying.—After allowing for breakage, it will take about 16 tiles and 16 collars to lay a rod in length of drain. The cost of these will, of course, be very much affected by the considerations of the nearness of the tile-kiln and the cost of transportation. They should, in no ordinary case, cost, delivered on the ground, more than $8 per thousand for 1-1/4-inch tiles, and $4 per thousand for the collars, making a total of $12 for both, equal to about 19 cents per rod. The laying of the tiles, may be set down at 2 cents per rod,—based on a skilled man laying 100 rods daily, and receiving $2 per day.
Covering and filling will probably cost 10 cents per rod, (if the scraper, Fig. 39, can be successfully used for the rough filling, the cost will be reduced considerably below this.)
The four items of the cost of making one rod of lateral drain are as follows:
| Digging the ditches | - - - .43 |
| Grading | - - - .06 |
| Tiles and laying | - - - .21 |
| Covering and filling | - - - .10 |
| - - -.80 cts. |
If the drains are placed at intervals of 40 feet, there are required 64 rods to the acre,—this at 80 cents per rod will make the cost per acre,—for the above items,—$51.20.
[pg 158]How much should be allowed for main drains, outlets, and silt-basins, it is impossible to say, as, on irregular ground, no two fields will require the same amount of this sort of work. On very even land, where the whole surface, for hundreds of acres, slopes gradually in one or two directions, the outlay for mains need not be more than two per cent. of the cost of the laterals. This would allow laterals of a uniform length of 800 feet to discharge into the main line, at intervals of 40 feet, if we do not consider the trifling extra cost of the larger tiles. On less regular ground, the cost of mains will often be considerably more than two per cent. of the cost of the laterals; but in some instances the increase of main lines will be fully compensated for by the reduction in the length of the laterals, which, owing to rocks, hills too steep to need drains at regular intervals, and porous, (gravelly,) streaks in the land, cannot be profitably made to occupy the whole area so thoroughly.22
Probably 7-1/2 per cent. of the cost of the laterals for mains, outlets, and silt-basins will be a fair average allowance.
This will bring the total cost of the work to about $60 per acre, made up as follows:
Cost of the finished drains per acre - - - $51.20
7-1/2 per cent. added for mains, etc. - - - 3.83
Engineering and Superintendence - - - 5.00
Of course this is an arbitrary calculation, an estimate without a single ascertained fact to go upon,—but it is as[pg 159] close as it can be made to what would probably be the cost of the best work, on average ground, at the present high prices of labor and material. Five years ago the same work could have been done for from $40 to $45 per acre, and it will be again cheaper when wages fall, and when a greater demand for draining tiles shall have caused more competition in their manufacture. With a large general demand, such as has existed in England for the last 20 years, they would now be sold for one-half of their present price here, and the manufacture would be more profitable.
There are many light lands on retentive subsoils, which could be drained, at present prices, for $50 or less per acre, and there are others, which are very hard to dig, on which thorough-draining could not now be done for $60.
The cost and the promise of the operation in each instance, must guide the land owner in deciding whether or not to undertake the improvement.
In doubtful cases, there is one compromise which may be safely made,—that is, to omit each alternate drain, and defer its construction until labor is cheaper.
This is doing half the work,—a very different thing from half-doing the work. In such cases, the lines should be laid out as though they were to be all done at once, and, finally, when the omitted drains are made, it should be in pursuance of the original plan. Probably the drains which are laid will produce more than one-half of the benefit that would result if they were all laid, but they will rarely be satisfactory, except as a temporary expedient, and the saving will be less than would at first seem likely, for when the second drains are laid; the cultivation of the land must be again interrupted; the draining force must be again brought together; the levels of the new lines must be taken, and connected with those of the old ones; and great care must be taken, selecting the dryest weather for[pg 160] the work,—to admit very little, if any, muddy water into the old mains.
This practice of draining by installments is not recommended; it is only suggested as an allowable expedient, when the cost of the complete work could not be borne with out inconvenience.
If any staid and economical farmer is disposed to be alarmed at the cost of draining, he is respectfully reminded of the miles of expensive stone walls and other fences, in New England and many other parts of the country, which often are a real detriment to the farms, occupying, with their accompanying bramble bushes and head lands, acres of valuable land, and causing great waste of time in turning at the ends of short furrows in plowing;—while they produce no benefit at all adequate to their cost and annoyance.
It should also be considered that, just as the cost of fences is scarcely felt by the farmer, being made when his teams and hands could not be profitably employed in ordinary farming operations, so the cost of draining will be reduced in proportion to the amount of the work which he can "do within himself,"—without hiring men expressly for it. The estimate herein given is based on the supposition that men are hired for the work, at wages equal to $1.50 per day,—while draining would often furnish a great advantage to the farmer in giving employment to farm hands who are paid and subsisted by the year.
Starting with the basis of $60, as the cost of draining an acre of ordinary farm land;—what is the prospect that the work will prove remunerative?
In all of the older States, farmers are glad to lend their surplus funds, on bond and mortgage on their neighbors' farms, with interest at the rate of 7, and often 6 per cent.
In view of the fact that a little attention must be given each year to the outlets, and, to the silt-basins, as well, for the first few years, it will be just to charge for the use of the capital 8-1/3 per cent.
This will make a yearly charge on the land, for the benefits resulting from such a system of draining as has been described, of five dollars per acre.
Will it Pay?—Will the benefits accruing, year after year,—in wet seasons and in dry,—with root crops and with grain,—with hay and with fruit,—in rotations of crops and in pasture,—be worth $5 an acre?
On this question depends the value of tile-draining as a practical improvement, for if there is a self-evident proposition in agriculture, it is that what is not profitable, one year with another, is not practical.
To counterbalance the charge of $5, as the yearly cost[pg 162] of the draining, each acre must produce, in addition to what it would have yielded without the improvement:
10 bushels of Corn at .50 per bushel.
3 bushels of Wheat at $1.66 per bushel.
5 bushels of Rye at 1.00 per bushel.
12-1/2 bushels of Oats at .40 per bushel.
10 bushels of Potatoes at .50 per bushel.
6-2/3 bushels of Barley at .75 per bushel.
1,000 pounds of Hay at 10.00 per ton.
50 pounds of Cotton at .10 per pound.
20 pounds of Tobacco at .25 per pound.
Surely this is not a large increase,—not in a single case,—and the prices are generally less than may be expected for years to come.
The United States Census Report places the average crop of Indian Corn, in Indiana and Illinois, at 33 bushels per acre. In New York it was but 27 bushels, and in Pennsylvania but 20 bushels. It would certainly be accounted extremely liberal to fix the average yield of such soils as need draining, at 30 bushels per acre. It is extremely unlikely that they would yield this, in the average of seasons, with the constantly recurring injury from backward springs, summer droughts, and early autumn frosts.
Heavy, retentive soils, which are cold and late in the spring, subject to hard baking in midsummer, and to become cold and wet in the early fall, are the very ones which are best suited, when drained, to the growth of Indian Corn. They are "strong" and fertile,—and should be able to absorb, and to prepare for the use of plants, the manure which is applied to them, and the fertilizing matters which are brought to them by each storm;—but they cannot properly exercise the functions of fertile soils, for the reason that they are strangled with water, chilled by evaporation, or baked to almost brick-like hardness, during nearly the whole period of the growth and ripening of the crop.[pg 163] The manure which has been added to them, as well as their own chemical constituents, are prevented from undergoing those changes which are necessary to prepare them for the uses of vegetation. The water of rains, finding the spaces in the soil already occupied by the water of previous rains, cannot enter to deposit the gases which it contains,—or, if the soil has been dried by evaporation under the influence of sun and wind, the surface is almost hermetically sealed, and the water is only slowly soaked up, much of it running off over the surface, or lying to be removed by the slow and chilling process of evaporation. In wet times and in dry, the air, with its heat, its oxygen, and its carbonic acid, (its universal solvent,) is forbidden to enter and do its beneficent work. The benefit resulting from cultivating the surface of the ground is counteracted by the first unfavorable change of the weather; a single heavy rain, by saturating the soil, returning it to nearly its original condition of clammy compactness. In favorable seasons, these difficulties are lessened, but man has no control over the seasons, and to-morrow may be as foul as to-day has been fair. A crop of corn on undrained, retentive ground, is subject to injury from disastrous changes of the weather, from planting until harvest. Even supposing that, in the most favorable seasons, it would yield as largely as though the ground were drained, it would lose enough in unfavorable seasons to reduce the average more than ten (10) bushels per acre.
The average crop, on such land, has been assumed to be 30 bushels per acre; it would be an estimate as moderate as this one is generous, to say that, with the same cultivation and the same manure, the average crop, after draining, would be 50 bushels, or an increase equal to twice as much as is needed to pay the draining charge. If the method of cultivation is improved, by deep plowing, ample manuring, and thorough working,—all of which may be more profitably applied to drained than to undrained[pg 164] land,—the average crop,—of a series of years,—will not be less than 60 bushels.
The cost of extra harvesting will be more than repaid by the value of the extra fodder, and the increased cultivation and manuring are lasting benefits, which can be charged, only in small part, to the current crop. Therefore, if it will pay to plow, plant, hoe and harvest for 30 bushels of corn, it will surely pay much better to double the crop at a yearly extra cost of $5, and, practically, it amounts to this;—the extra crop is nearly all clear gain.
The quantity of Wheat required to repay the annual charge for drainage is so small, that no argument is needed to show that any process which will simply prevent "throwing out" in winter, and the failure of the plant in the wetter parts of the field, will increase the product more than that amount,—to say nothing of the general importance to this crop of having the land in the most perfect condition, (in winter as well as in summer.)
It is stated that, since the general introduction of drainage in England, (within the past 25 years,) the wheat crop of that country has been more than doubled. Of course, it does not necessarily follow that the amount per acre has been doubled, large areas which were originally unfit for the growth of this crop, having been, by draining, excellently fitted for its cultivation;—but there can be no doubt that its yield has been greatly increased on all drained lands, nor that large areas, which, before being drained, were able to produce fair crops only in the best seasons, are now made very nearly independent of the weather.
It is not susceptible of demonstration, but it is undoubtedly true, that those clay or other heavy soils, which are devoted to the growth of wheat in this country, would, if they were thoroughly under-drained, produce, on the average of years, at least double their present crop.
Mr. John Johnston, a venerable Scotch farmer, who has[pg 165] long been a successful cultivator in the Wheat region of Western New York,—and who was almost the pioneer of tile-draining in America,—has laid over 50 miles of drains within the last 30 years. His practice is described in Klippart's Land Drainage, from which work we quote the following:
"Mr. Johnston says he never saw 100 acres in any one farm, but a portion of it would pay for draining. Mr. Johnston is no rich man who has carried a favorite hobby without regard to cost or profit. He is a hardworking Scotch farmer, who commenced a poor man, borrowed money to drain his land, has gradually extended his operations, and is now reaping the benefits, in having crops of 40 bushels of wheat to the acre. He is a gray-haired Nestor, who, after accumulating the experience of a long life, is now, at 68 years of age, written to by strangers in every State of the Union for information, not only in drainage matters, but all cognate branches of farming. He sits in his homestead, a veritable Humboldt in his way, dispensing information cheerfully through our agricultural papers and to private correspondents, of whom he has recorded 164 who applied to him last year. His opinions are, therefore, worth more than those of a host of theoretical men, who write without practice." * * * * *
"Although his farm is mainly devoted to wheat, yet a considerable area of meadow and some pasture has been retained. He now owns about 300 acres of land. The yield of wheat has been 40 bushels this year, and in former seasons, when his neighbors were reaping 8, 10, or 15 bushels, he has had 30 and 40." * * * * *
"Mr. Johnston says tile-draining pays for itself in two seasons, sometimes in one. Thus, in 1847, he bought a piece of 10 acres to get an outlet for his drains. It was a perfect quagmire, covered with coarse aquatic grasses, and so unfruitful that it would not give back the seed[pg 166] sown upon it. In 1848 a crop of corn was taken from it, which was measured and found to be eighty bushels per acre, and as, because of the Irish famine, corn was worth $1 per bushel that year, this crop paid not only all the expense of drainage, but the first cost of the land as well.
"Another piece of 20 acres, adjoining the farm of the late John Delafield, was wet, and would never bring more than 10 bushels of corn per acre. This was drained at a great cost, nearly $30 per acre. The first crop after this was 83 bushels and some odd pounds per acre. It was weighed and measured by Mr. Delafield, and the County Society awarded a premium to Mr. Johnston. Eight acres and some rods of this land, at one side, averaged 94 bushels, or the trifling increase of 84 bushels per acre over what it would bear before those insignificant clay tiles were buried in the ground. But this increase of crop is not the only profit of drainage; for Mr. Johnston says that, on drained land, one half the usual quantity of manure suffices to give maximum crops. It is not difficult to find a reason for this. When the soil is sodden with water, air can not enter to any extent, and hence oxygen can not eat off the surfaces of soil-particles and prepare food for plants; thus the plant must in great measure depend on the manure for sustenance, and, of course, the more this is the case, the more manure must be applied to get good crops. This is one reason, but there are others which we might adduce if one good one were not sufficient.
"Mr. Johnston says he never made money until he drained, and so convinced is he of the benefits accruing from the practice, that he would not hesitate,—as he did not when the result was much more uncertain than at present,—to borrow money to drain. Drains well laid, endure, but unless a farmer intends doing the job well, he had best leave it alone and grow poor, and move out West, and all that sort of thing. Occupiers of apparently[pg 167] dry land are not safe in concluding that they need not go to the expense of draining, for if they will but dig a three-foot ditch in even the driest soil, water will be found in the bottom at the end of eight hours, and if it does come, then draining will pay for itself speedily."
Some years ago, the Rural New Yorker published a letter from one of its correspondents from which the following is extracted:—
"I recollect calling upon a gentleman in the harvest field, when something like the following conversation occurred:
'Your wheat, sir, looks very fine; how many acres have you in this field?'
'In the neighborhood of eight, I judge.'
'Did you sow upon fallow?'
'No sir. We turned over green sward—sowed immediately upon the sod, and dragged it thoroughly—and you see the yield will probably be 25 bushels to the acre, where it is not too wet.'
'Yes sir, it is mostly very fine. I observed a thin strip through it, but did not notice that it was wet.'
'Well, it is not very wet. Sometimes after a rain, the water runs across it, and in spring and fall it is just wet enough to heave the wheat and kill it.'
I inquired whether a couple of good drains across the lot would not render it dry.
'Perhaps so—but there is not over an acre that is killed out.'
'Have you made an estimate of the loss you annually sustain from this wet place?'
'No, I had not thought much about it.'
'Would $30 be too high?'
'O yes, double.'
'Well, let's see; it cost you $3 to turn over the sward? Two bushels of seed, $2; harrowing in, 75 cents; interest, taxes, and fences, $5.25; 25 bushels of wheat lost, $25.'
'Deduct for harvesting—--'
'No; the straw would pay for that.'
'Very well, all footed $36.'
'What will the wheat and straw on this acre be worth this year?'
'Nothing, as I shall not cut the ground over.'
'Then it appears that you have lost, in what you have actually expended, and the wheat you would have harvested, had the ground been dry, $36, a pretty large sum for one acre.'
'Yes I see,' said the farmer."
While Rye may be grown, with tolerable advantage, on lands which are less perfectly drained than is necessary for Wheat, there can be no doubt that an increase of more than the six and two-thirds bushels needed to make up the drainage charge will be the result of the improvement.
While Oats will thrive in soils which are too wet for many other crops, the ability to plant early, which is secured by an early removal from the soil of its surplus water, will ensure, one year with another, more than twelve and a half bushels of increased product.
In the case of Potatoes, also, the early planting will be a great advantage; and, while the cause of the potato-rot is not yet clearly discovered, it is generally conceded that, even if it does not result directly from too great wetness of the soil, its development is favored by this condition, either from a direct action on the tubers, or from the effect in the air immediately about the plants, of the exhalations of a humid soil.
An increase of from five to ten per cent. on a very ordinary crop of potatoes, will cover the drainage charge, and with facilities for marketing, the higher price of the earlier yield is of much greater consequence.
Barley will not thrive in wet soil, and there is no question that drainage would give it much more than the increased yield prescribed above.
As to hay, there are many wet, rich soils which produce very large crops of grass, and it is possible that drainage might not always cause them to yield a thousand pounds more of hay to the acre, but the quality of the hay from the drained soil, would, of itself, more than compensate for the drainage charge. The great benefit of the improvement, with reference to this crop, however, lies in the fact that, although wet, grass lands,—and by "wet" is meant the condition of undrained, retentive clays, and heavy loams, or other soils requiring drainage,—in a very few years "run out," or become occupied by semi-aquatic[pg 169] and other objectionable plants, to the exclusion of the proper grasses; the same lands, thoroughly drained, may be kept in full yield of the finest hay plants, as long as the ground is properly managed. It must, of course, be manured, from time to time, and care should be taken to prevent the puddling of its surface, by men or animals, while it is too wet from recent rain. With proper attention to these points, it need not be broken up in a lifetime, and it may be relied on to produce uniformly good crops, always equal to the best obtained before drainage.
So far as Cotton and Tobacco are concerned, there are not many instances recorded of the systematic drainage of lands appropriated to their cultivation, but there is every reason to suppose that they will both be benefitted by any operation which will have the effect of placing the soil in a better condition for the uses of all cultivated plants. The average crop of tobacco is about 700 lbs., and that of cotton probably 250 lbs. An addition of one-fifth to the cotton crop, and of only one thirty-fifth to the tobacco crop, would make the required increase.
The failure of the cotton crop, during the past season, (1866,) might have been entirely prevented, in many districts, by the thorough draining of the land.
The advantages claimed for drainage with reference to the above-named staple crops, will apply with equal, if not greater force, to all garden and orchard culture. In fact, with the exception of osier willows, and cranberries, there is scarcely a cultivated plant which will not yield larger and better crops on drained than on undrained land,—enough better, and enough larger, to pay much more than the interest on the cost of the improvement.
Yet, this advantage of draining, is, by no means, the only one which is worthy of consideration. Since the object of cultivation is to produce remunerative crops, of course, the larger and better the crops, the more completely is the object attained;—and to this extent the greatest[pg 170] benefit resulting from draining, lies in the increased yield. But there is another advantage,—a material and moral advantage,—which is equally to be considered.
Instances of the profit resulting from under-draining, (coupled, as it almost always is, with improved cultivation,) are frequently published, and it would be easy to fortify this chapter with hundreds of well authenticated cases. It is, however, deemed sufficient to quote the following, from an old number of one of the New York dailies:—
"Some years ago, the son of an English farmer came to the United States, and let himself as a farm laborer, in New York State, on the following conditions: Commencing work at the first of September, he was to work ten hours a day for three years, and to receive in payment a deed of a field containing twelve acres—securing himself by an agreement, by which his employer was put under bonds of $2,000 to fulfill his part of the contract; also, during these three years, he was to have the control of the field; to work it at his own expense, and to give his employer one-half the proceeds. The field lay under the south side of a hill, was of dark, heavy clay resting on a bluish-colored, solid clay subsoil, and for many years previous, had not been known to yield anything but a yellowish, hard, stunted vegetation.
"The farmer thought the young man was a simpleton, and that he, himself, was most wise and fortunate; but the former, nothing daunted by this opinion, which he was not unconscious that the latter entertained of him, immediately hired a set of laborers, and set them to work in the field trenching, as earnestly as it was well possible for men to labor. In the morning and evening, before and after having worked his ten hours, as per agreement, he worked with them, and continued to work in this way until, about the middle of the following November, he had finished the laying of nearly 5,000 yards of good tile under-drains. He then had the field plowed deep and thoroughly, and the earth thrown up as much as possible into ridges, and thus let it remain during the winter. Next spring he had the field again plowed as before, then cross-plowed and thoroughly pulverized with a heavy harrow, then sowed it with oats and clover. The yield was excellent—nothing to be compared to it had ever before been seen upon that field. Next year it gave two crops of clover, of a rich dark green, and enormously heavy and luxuriant; and the year following, after being manured at an expense of some $7 an acre, nine acres of the field yielded 936 bushels of corn, and 25 wagon loads of pumpkins; while from the remaining three acres were taken 100 bushels of potatoes—the return of this crop being upwards of $1,200. The time had now come for the field to fall into the young[pg 171] man's possession, and the farmer unhesitatingly offered him $1,500 to relinquish his title to it; and when this was unhesitatingly refused, he offered $2,000, which was accepted.
"The young man's account stood thus
| Half proceeds of oats and straw, first year | $165 00 |
| Half value of sheep pasturage, first year | 25 00 |
| Half of first crops of clover, first year | 112 50 |
| Half of second crops of clover, including seed, second year | 135 00 |
| Half of sheep pasturage, second year | 15 00 |
| Half of crops of corn, pumpkins and potatoes, third year | 690 00 |
| Received from farmer, for relinquishment of title | 2,000 00 |
| ——— | |
| Account Dr. | $3,142 50 |
| To under-draining, labor and tiles | $325 00 |
| To labor and manure, three seasons | 475 00 |
| To labor given to farmer, $16 per month, 36 months | 576 00—1,376 00 |
| ——— | |
| Balance in his favor | $1,766 50 |
Draining makes the farmer, to a great extent, the master of his vocation. With a sloppy, drenched, cold, uncongenial soil, which is saturated with every rain, and takes days, and even weeks, to become sufficiently dry to work upon, his efforts are constantly baffled by unfavorable weather, at those times when it is most important that his work proceed without interruption. Weeks are lost, at a season when they are all too short for the work to be done. The ground must be hurriedly, and imperfectly prepared, and the seed is put in too late, often to rot in the over-soaked soil, requiring the field to be planted again at a time which makes it extremely doubtful whether the crop will ripen before the frost destroys it.
The necessary summer cultivation, between the rows, has to be done as the weather permits; and much more of it is required because of the baking of the ground. The whole life of the farmer, in fact, becomes a constant struggle with nature, and he fights always at a disadvantage. What he does by the work of days, is mainly undone by a single night's storm. Weeds grow apace, and the land is too wet to admit of their being exterminated. By the time that it is dry enough, other pressing work[pg 172] occupies the time; and if, finally, a day comes when they may be attacked, they offer ten times the resistance that they would have done a week earlier. The operations of the farm are carried on more expensively than if the ability to work constantly allowed a smaller force to be employed. The crops which give such doubtful promise, require the same cultivation as though they were certain to be remunerative, and the work can be done only with increased labor, because of the bad condition of the soil.
From force of tradition and of habit, the farmer accepts his fate and plods through his hard life, piously ascribing to the especial interference of an inscrutable Providence, the trials which come of his own neglect to use the means of relief which Providence has placed within his reach.
Trouble enough he must have, at any rate, but not necessarily all that he now has. It is not within the scope of the best laid drains to control storm or sunshine,—but it is within their power to remove the water of the storm, rapidly and sufficiently, and to allow the heat of the sunshine to penetrate the soil and do its hidden work. No human improvement can change any of the so-called "phenomena" of nature, or prevent the action of the least of her laws; but their effects upon the soil and its crops may be greatly modified, and that which, under certain circumstances, would have caused inconvenience or loss, may, by a change of circumstances, be made positively beneficial.
In the practice of agriculture, which is pre-eminently an economic art, draining will be prosecuted because of the pecuniary profit which it promises, and,—very properly,—it will not be pursued, to any considerable extent, where the money, which it costs, will not bring money in return. Yet, in a larger view of the case, its collateral advantages are of even greater moment than its mere profits. It is the foundation and the commencement of the most intelligent farming. It opens the way for other[pg 173] improvements, which, without it, would produce only doubtful or temporary benefits; and it enables the farmer so to extend and enlarge his operations, with fair promise of success, as to raise his occupation from a mere waiting upon the uncertain favors of nature, to an intelligent handling of her forces, for the attainment of almost certain results.
The rude work of an unthinking farmer, who scratches the surface soil with his plow, plants his seed, and trusts to the chances of a greater or less return, is unmitigated drudgery,—unworthy of an intelligent man; but he who investigates all of the causes of success and failure in farming, and adapts every operation to the requirements of the circumstances under which he works; doing everything in his power that may tend to the production of the results which he desires, and, so far as possible, avoiding everything that may interfere with his success,—leaving nothing to chance that can be secured, and securing all that chance may offer,—is engaged in the most ennobling, the most intelligent and the most progressive of all industrial avocations.
In the cultivation of retentive soils, drainage is the key to all improvement, and its advantage is to be measured not simply by the effect which it directly produces in increasing production, but, in still greater degree, by the extent to which it prepares the way for the successful application of improved processes, makes the farmer independent of weather and season, and offers freer scope to intelligence in the direction of his affairs.