1916.] ' WHY GROW ALFALFA? 73 



grown in the United States for some years and from States as far 

 north as Montana. How can you get it ? Well, one way is to 

 have one of your farm bureau agents find a reliable grower and 

 then bu3^ of him. Another way is to find a reliable dealer and 

 and then put it up to him to furnish you good seed at a reasonable 

 rate. I found that we could get for the members of our farm 

 bureau good seed at $7.80 per bushel of 60 pounds, and that at a 

 time when other farmers were paying $13 and $15 for the same 

 seed. It strikes me that there is nothing that your State asso- 

 ciation can do that will help more than to discover among 

 yourselves a member who knows where you can get good seed ; 

 then have him arrange so that you can get seed from him or his 

 dealer. We have a form or legal paper which a man may deposit 

 in his local bank with the money for the seed. The form provides 

 that when the seed arrives, the bank pays the bill and that 

 automatically releases the seed to the buyer. 



Of course members of this association will not run the risk of 

 planting seed until their farm bureau agent or their State college 

 men have examined and tested their seed. There is too much 

 danger of dodder. After I had examined the seed from one seed 

 house, and had Pennsylvania State College examine it, and had 

 the men in the United States Department of Agriculture at Wash- 

 ington examine it, I found that the seed house had sent a farmer 

 seed in which he might plant thirteen dodder seeds to a square 

 rod. If you once get dodder on your place, you will probably be 

 unable to grow paying crops of alfalfa for five or more years. 

 My advice is to have samples of the seed examined by some one 

 who knows how to examine and test alfalfa seed. But even that 

 does not assure you that it is northern grown seed. Therefore, 

 get seed from a reliable seed man, pay him a reasonable price, 

 but give him to understand that he is to be responsible for the 

 delivery of first-class northern grown, acclimated seed. 



Give the Soil or ike Seed Abundant Inoculation. 



There are two ways to inoculate. One way is to go to a field 

 where alfalfa is being grown and where there are plenty of nod- 

 ules on the roots and take the soil from there and spread the soil 

 over the field which you intend to sow to alfalfa. There are 

 people who will tell you that 200 or 300 pounds of soil will do. 



