304 Bureau of Fakmers' Institutes. 



which is unavailable. Wood ashes may be applied in place of the 

 lime. They contain about GO per cent, of lime, four to five per 

 cent, of potash, and one and a half per cent, of phosphoric acid; 

 but the latter is very slowly available. Good, unleached hard- 

 wood ashes ought to be worth from §G to $7 per ton, depending 

 upon locality and the cost of lime. 



HoAv early is it advisable to sow clover seed on winter grains? 

 A Farmer. — I sow it in March. 



Mr. Cook. — We sow it on the sugar snow, say the first to the 

 middle of April, sometimes a little later in the season. 



Should alfalfa be sown in an orchard? Would it injure the trees? 



Mr. Armstrong. — I have an uncle in the West where they grow 

 a great deal of alfalfa, who sowed some in his orchard, but a 

 number of his trees died, before he could plow up the alfalfa. He 

 thought it rooted so deeply that it took all the moisture away 

 from the roots of the trees. 



A Farmer. — Will alfalfa grow on steep hillsides? 



Another Farmer. — Xot on yours. It would all slide off. 



Mr. Smith. — It will grow if the soil is suitable. 



Will Mr. Terry tell us how to raise the first crop of clover on poor land? 



Mr. Terry. — I cannot answer that, but there may be circum- 

 stances where the farmer may help himself. Sometimes a soil is 

 acid. If it is, clover will not grow. An application of 20 or 25 

 bushels of lime per acre, or of potash, will sweeten the soil. At 

 other times a lack of humus prevents the soil from holding 

 moisture, so the young clover plants, when the drouth comes, 

 die out. Between the two — lime and potash — with the humus in 

 the soil, as a rule, clover may be made to grow. I would not sow 

 timothy except, possibly, in small quantities, say four quarts of 

 seed per acre. 



Wlint would you do with the clover when grown? 



Mr. Terry. — ^That would depend. Formerly, we plowed under 

 the second growth of clover. We then kept no cows. Now we are 

 keeping some, and so cut some of the second growth clover far 

 them. We have built up a herd which gave 7,341 pounds of milk 

 last year. One two-year-old heifer gave 6,000 pounds. We now 



