Kim Fundingsland/MDN Water flows through a control valve and follows a ditch located just west of Towner. The water is being redirected as part of the Eaton Irrigation Project.

TOWNER – Water flowing over the low haylands near here is bringing life-saving relief to plants that have suffered from a lack of snow melt and an absence of spring rains.

Without the Eaton Irrigation Project, the lush hay meadows that provide necessary forage for farm animals in the area would grow very little, if at all.

Following a lack of snow cover this winter, and only a few sprinkles of rain so far this spring, the water released into the Souris River from Lake Darling Dam is critical to the production of hay in the heart of the state’s cattle country.

“It’s big cattle country all along here. We’ve got 42 landowners in the project and I’d say 35 of them would be pretty-much out of the cow/calf business without that water. It’s critical for this area,” said Cliff Hanretty, long-time Eaton Irrigation Project board member. “In a dry year like this, I doubt we’d even get one-fourth of the production. Water is a precious thing.