Yuma County: A Case Study

Kate Havins
P.d. 1
Wolthuis
How irrigation impacted Yuma County
You are probably wondering what and where Yuma County is? What does Yuma County revolve around? What do you see almost everyday while driving around Yuma? Yuma County is a small city located at the bottom southwest region of Arizona, close to the Mexico border.
Yuma County revolves mostly around crops, dams, canals and many other agricultural related sources. All of those resources revolve around agriculture and In order to have agriculture they needed a way to distribute water to the fields where the crops are growing. That 's when irrigation systems and canals came into play. Irrigation has
This project was estimated to produce thirty­seven million dollars in crop production.2 The buyout impacted approximately five­thousand residents from Yuma County, which had to move away in order for the people who bought the land to start the building process of irrigation systems and canals.
The Yuma Auxiliary Project also played a large role in affecting the start of irrigation in
Yuma County. It was the first federal project on the Colorado River. The purpose of the Yuma
Auxiliary Project was to distribute water around Yuma, Arizona using the Colorado River. The
Yuma Auxiliary Project was established by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.3 They created the
Yuma Auxiliary Project to irrigate 68,000 acres of land in Yuma County.4"The Yuma Auxiliary 's project office worked to furnish water to 2500 acres of land on the "B" Unit of the Mesa by April
1, 1922. Unit "B" eventually irrigated over 3,000 acres an Yuma Mesa"5. When the Yuma
Auxiliary Project was completed it had consisted of eighteen miles of laterals and almost
Yuma County benefited greatly from irrigation and is still. Irrigation has helped agriculture in Yuma, Agriculture is the biggest industry in Yuma, Arizona. Most residents from Yuma work with agriculture. A negative of starting irrigation systems and canals in Yuma County was floods. Sometimes the Colorado
River would overflow from too much rainfall, other River water or the break of a canal would cause flooding in Yuma County. Yuma County had a major flood in 1916 caused by the break of a canal.
How were they going to irrigate the water across all of Yuma County? Yuma has one main canal that travels throughout all of Yuma County. The main canal is connected to the
Colorado River. That main Canal carries water all the way from Welton to Yuma valley. Along the way of the Main Canal, there are ditch banks attached to the main canal. The ditch banks carry the water from the main canal to the fields where the farmers have their crops. The