1916.] WHY GROW ALFALFA? 69 



merit station. Write to your experiment station and ask the men 

 there what they know about feeding alfalfa. Your land may not 

 be of the same kind as that on which they have experimented, and 

 hence you may need other help. I can think of no place more 

 valuable for one to come, once a year, than to a gathering like 

 the New England Alfalfa Association meeting, and there compare 

 notes and hear the experiences of farmers who have been grow- 

 ing alfalfa. But when ail is said and done you must do a little 

 experimenting on your own farm: Sow different strips on your 

 alfalfa field with different amounts of the different fertilizers and 

 then watch for results. But to start alfalfa you should have a 

 rich soil, and you should use something like 500 pounds to an 

 acre of a mixture of about 3 per cent, of nitrogen, 8 per cent, of 

 phosphoric acid and 10 per cent, of potash. 



Select Well-drained Soil. 



Alfalfa comes to us from the semi-arid regions of southern 

 Asia. To be sure it has been grovvm in Europe for centuries, and 

 in America for some years, yet it shows its desert origin by 

 demanding a well-drained soil. Alfalfa will not live with its head 

 in the water. It will do well on loose sandy or stony soil. Alfalfa 

 will thrive on a stony hillside so full of rock and so dry that corn 

 will not develop an ear. I knovv^ of two pieces on such soil, one 

 has been down for six years and the other for nine. The soil is 

 so dry and sandy that blue grass and plantain, the two worst 

 weed enemies of alfalfa, have not gotten a foothold. Of course a 

 man gets more alfalfa on better ground, but he gets more dollars 

 worth of feed from such a stone patch than he can get from seed- 

 ing it to any other plant, unless it be sweet clover. 



Alfalfa seems to thrive best on a southern slope. I think that 

 this is explained in part by the fact that southern slopes are dryer 

 in fall and winter. Perhaps the ground is sweeter and does not 

 heave so seriously. Alfalfa can stand more cold than most other 

 plants. After the first year it does not winter kill in a tempera- 

 ture from 20^ to 30*^ below zero. Alfalfa is green a month longer 

 in the fall and a month earlier in the spring. Perhaps the 

 southern slopes are favorable because alfalfa can get a better 

 * growth for winter covering in the fall, and an earlier growth in 

 the spring. This does not mean that you cannot grow alfalfa on 



