The first homesteaders who settled on Mormon Row were dry-land farmers. They relied on snowmelt soaking into the soil and rainfall during the growing season to support their crops. The catastrophic flood of 1927 damaged many of the irrigation works from the Gros Ventre River. Around the same time, the Kelly Warm Springs began to produce more water. Homesteaders cut a ditch from the springs west to irrigate their dry lands allowing the settlers to shift from dry land farming to raising cattle and hay.