Irrigated Eden : the making of an agricultural landscape in the American West / Mark Fiege ; foreword by William Cronon.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Fiege, Mark.

Series:

Weyerhaeuser environmental book.

Weyerhaeuser environmental books

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Irrigation farming--Snake River Valley (Wyo.-Wash.).

Irrigation farming.

Irrigation farming--Idaho.

Irrigation--Snake River Valley (Wyo.-Wash.).

Irrigation.

Irrigation--Idaho.

Water-supply--Snake River Valley (Wyo.-Wash.).

Water-supply.

Water-supply--Idaho.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (363 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Seattle ; London : University of Washington Press, c1999.

Language Note:

English

System Details:

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

Summary:

Irrigation came to the arid West in a wave of optimism about the power of water to make the desert bloom. Mark Fiege’s fascinating and innovative study of irrigation in southern Idaho’s Snake River valley describes a complex interplay of human and natural systems. Using vast quantities of labor, irrigators built dams, excavated canals, laid out farms, and brought millions of acres into cultivation. But at each step, nature rebounded and compromised the intended agricultural order. The result was a new and richly textured landscape made of layer upon layer of technology and intractable natural forces-one that engineers and farmers did not control with the precision they had anticipated. Irrigated Eden vividly portrays how human actions inadvertently helped to create a strange and sometimes baffling ecology.Winner of the Idaho Library Association Book Award, 1999Winner of the Charles A. Weyerhaeuser Award, Forest History Society, 1999-2000

Contents:

Contents; Foreword by William Cronon; Acknowledgments; Introduction: Discovering the Irrigated Landscape; 1. Genesis: Water, Earth, and Irrigation Systems; 2. Habitat: The Irrigated Landscape and Its Biota; 3. Dividing Water: Conflict, Cooperation, and Allocation on the Upper Snake River; 4. Labor and Landscape: Irrigated Agriculture and Work; 5. From Field to Market: Agricultural Production in the Irrigated Landscape; 6. Industrial Eden: Myth, Metaphor, and the Irrigated Landscape; Conclusion: A World in the Making; Notes; Selected Bibliography; Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 277-305) and index.

Description based on print version record and CIP data provided by publisher; resource not viewed.

ISBN:

9780295989747

0295989742

OCLC:

698590896

Publisher Number:

2027/heb33016 hdl