The Bulletin. 



Volume 27. North Carolina State Board of Agriculture. Number 6. 



Entered at the Raleigh Post-office as second-class mail matter. 



The Bulletin is published monthly by the State Board of Agriculture. 



RALEIGH, JUNE, 1906. 



ALFALFA GROWING. 



BY C. B. WILLIAMS. 



For the past two or three years greatly increased interest has been 

 manifested throughout the State in the growth of alfalfa, and, as a. 

 result, during this time thousands of inquiries from different locali- 

 ties concerning the value and adaptability of this plant to North 

 Carolina conditions, as well as to the proper method of preparation of 

 soil, time of planting, kind and amount of fertilizer to use, etc., have 

 been received by the State Department of Agriculture. It is in 

 response to this popular demand for information on alfalfa, with the 

 realization of its great value for forage purposes, that this Bulletin 

 has been prepared. 



There is hardly any plant known the successful culture of which 

 would give greater impetus to profitable live-stock growing, or that 

 would stimulate a higher appreciation of the great importance and 

 value of thorough preparation of the soil and rational fertilization 

 upon successful farming, than alfalfa. 



HISTORY, 



' Alfalfa, a native of southwestern Asia, five centuries prior to the 

 Christian era, had been carried to and cultivated in southern Eu- 

 rope. The Romans used and appreciated it as a feed for their 

 chariot and war horses before the birth of Christ. From Italy, in 

 which country its growth has been maintained continuously to the 

 present day, it found its way into Spain and France. The Span- 

 iards during the Spanish Invasion carried it into South America 

 and Mexico. During the middle of the nineteenth century it was in- 

 troduced into this country through California by the Chilians. Since 

 then it has gradually spread eastward, imtil to-day there is probably 

 not a State or Territory in the Union in which this oldest of cultivated 

 forage plants is not grown to some extent. Where this plant has come 



