FOURTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART I. 41 



and will furnish, nitrogen to the alfalfa plant until it reaches full vigor, 

 when it will yield a much larger crop than clover and each pound of 

 the alfalfa be worth considerably more than an equal amount of clover. 

 In several cases known to the speaker red clover has been sown as a 

 nurse crop with alfalfa with good success. 



I'KEPARATIOX OF THE SOIL. 



The ground for alfalfa should be thoroughly pulverized and deeply 

 plowed, but it must be well settled before seeding and only the surface 

 loose. Alfalfa will usually fail if seeded on freshly plowed ground. 

 It is necessary to plow the ground before seeding; plow, as early as 

 ^russible, harrow thoroughly, making a good seed bed, and then wait 

 until a good rain has settled the soil before seeding. 



A careful farmer and a careless renter a few years ago put in 

 alfalfa in adjoining fields in northeastern Kansas, where conditions are 

 similar to those found in Iowa. The farmer plowed the land deeply 

 'and pulverized it until it was like a garden bed. He immediately 

 sowed alfalfa, secured a thick stand, and in a few months the alfalfa 

 entirely died out. The renter thought it would not pay to spend much 

 time on another man's land. His field had been in corn the previous 

 year. He broke the stalks with a pole, sowed ihe seel broadcast, and 

 covered it lightly with a harrow. He secured a good stand that was 

 permanent. Usually a good stand can not be secured with so little 

 preparation, but a deep, mellow seed bed at seeding time generally in- 

 sures a failure. The more thoroughly the seed bed is prepared the 

 better, if it is allowed to settle before seeding. 



When fall plowing is practicable the surface should be fixed as for a 

 garden in the spring just before seeding, but the stirring should not be 

 done deeply. The seed bed is the most important factor in securing a 

 -rand of alfalfa. 



PASTUEIXG ALFALFA. 



When alfalfa has become well introduced in Iowa it will be largely 

 used for hog pasture. Where hogs are given a small feed of corn daily 

 while on pasture, from five hundred to one thousand pounds of gain 

 can be put on during the summer on the hogs for each acre pastured, 

 in addition to the gain made by the corn. A suggestion in regard to 

 pasturing may be in order. Alfalfa throws up stems from buds growing 

 in a crown above ground. If this crown is eaten off the plant is either 

 killed or greatly weakened. To pasture hogs on alfalfa and maintain 

 a good stand, divide the field into two parts. Mow these parts alternate 

 years and each year pasture the hogs on the part that was kept for 

 hay the previous year. The stubs left in mowing will keep the hogs 

 from eating the crowns too closely. 



EE-SEEDING. 



In Kansas we found it much easier to get a good stand of alfalfa 

 on ground where alfalfa had previously been grown than on land that 



