Cole's Combined System of Drainage and Irrigation - a New System of Agriculture

COLE'S COMBINED SYSTEM Drainage and Irrigation. A NEW SYSTEM OF AGRICULTURE by A. N. COLE, First published in 1889. Preface: Biographical Sketch of A. N. Cole Water a Necessity for Vegetation Drainage The New System CONTENTS. PAGE: Stone Storage Trenches 33 Tile 36 Square 36 Cement For Sand Lands 37 Depth and Distance of Storage Trenches 38 Family and Market Gardens 39 Lawns 40 Orchards . 5 7-8 23 29 33 40 Grass Lands 41 Arable Lands 42 Artesian Wells 42 Swamp Lands 43 Workings of the System Effects on Soil. 46 Crops 48 Builds up Soils 50 Use of Hot Water 56 Five Crops a Year 57 Irrigation in Florida 65 Mr. Coles Model Plot 68 Reports 69 French Methods 86 Ridits of Application Obituary... PREFACE, CONSTANT and increasing demand from every part of the world, especially from all sections of our own country, for a cheap Manual descriptive of Mr. Coles system of Drainage and Irrigation, has at last induced him to intrust to me the work of arranging this book, he being too ill at this time to do so. In its .preparation I shall endeavor to treat the subject in a most practi- cal manner, and in the fewest possible words necessary to the end in view, and yet complete enough that all may fully understand, and for themselves see its numberless advantages and possibilities. In the facts stated we have been conservative, feeling to under, rather than overdraw them. it better Speaking for Mr. Cole, we extend to every reader of this Man- ual an invitation to visit the 1 Home on the Hillside, and make personal examination of his work and its results. The grounds are open to public inspection at all times. A. P. COLE. Biographical sketch of the life and services of the Hon. A. N. Cole, of the Home on the Hillside, Wellsville, Allegany County, N. Y. CHAPTER I. As a frontispiece to this volume, we open its pages by introduction of the likeness of the originator of what has been denominated aquaculture, the new agriculture, or sub-irrigation. The relations of father and son existing between the author of this sketch and the originator of the New Agriculture, makes it a matter of delicacy to undertake this biography, and yet, feeling as we do that none know the man on whose life we discourse better than his firstborn, we waive considerations of delicacy and proceed to our work cheerfully. It would be impossible to write out in anything like detail even the more striking features of the life of a man ofwhom it may be aptly said he knew no youth, but entered upon the work of the full-grown man at the age of fourteen, knowing little of rest or respite for the full period of three score years, having wrought almost incessantly in one way and another for the good of his fellow-men. Inclined to leave to the pens of others, as far as may be, that manner of mention most commendatory of his work, we introduce at opening an editorial appearing a few months since in the columns ofColmans Rural World, as follows Mr. Cole was born in Cattaraugus County, N. Y., in 1821, and is no longer a young man in the matter of years. He comes from grand old stock, and inherits an amount of vitality which renews its youth with passing years, hence never gets old. The Plymouth or Roger Williams Colony at Freedom, Cattaraugus County, N. Y., embraced rep- resentatives of the blue blood of nearly or quite all of the early Pilgrim families. The first great swarm that went out from Plymouth and Provi- dence settled in the Genessee Valley and along the Cattaraugus Creek in the beginning of the present century. Others followed until nearly all the counties of Western New York, North-western Pennsylvania, and the