11 



The writer has never heard of injurious results from bloating with 

 any kind of farm stock pasturing on Alfalfa, providing it is used in com- 

 bination with grasses and clovers in the form of a permanent pasture. 



In each of five or six years, seed has been produced at the College 

 from either the first or the second cuttings of Alfalfa. The results have 

 been about the same from each cutting. The production of seed has been 

 only fairly satisfactory at the College, but in some parts of Ontario Alfalfa 

 seed growing is becoming an important industry. 



No extensive experimental work has been conducted at the College in 

 the production of Alfalfa silage, but a few reports have been received, 

 stating that the crop can be used in that way with fair satisfaction. 



Alfalfa certainly produces a large amount of exceedingly valuable 

 material to use as a green manure. In the majority of cases, however, 

 it is probably better to use the crop for feeding purposes, and then to save 

 the manure and return it to the land in that form rather than to plow 

 under the whole crop. 



It is quite probable that there are many crops more suitable for using 

 as a cover crop in orchards than Alfalfa. The growth of the plants is 

 upright and rather open, and the roots penetrate so deeply into the soil 

 that they tend to rob the subsoil of its fertility and of its moisture, both 

 of which are so essential to the best welfare of the trees. 



Quality of Alfalfa as a Feed. 



In the years 1897 and 1898 Alfalfa was grown in our Experimental 

 Department, and in comparison with red clover and with timothy both 

 the chemical composition and the digestibility of the crops were determined 

 in the Chemical Department of the College. The results of these investi- 

 gations were given in detail in the Ontario Agricultural College Bulletin 

 in, which was issued in the year 1900. The following table gives the 

 comparative amounts of digestible constituents in one ton of hay of each 

 of the three crops : 



The figures here presented are quite suggestive and are worthy of 

 careful study. 



In "Farmers' Bulletin Number 215," issued by the Department of 

 Agriculture of the United States in 1905, we find in the investigations 

 there quoted the digestible protein to be 10.44 P er cent, for Alfalfa hay 

 and 6.8 per cent, for red clover hay. These figures would be equal to 



