AX ANNUAL WHITE SWEET CLOVER. 

 L. H. PAMMEL AND C. M. KING. 



Sonietime previous to the spriiis of 1916 Professor Hughes of 

 the Fa.rm Crops Department of the Iowa State College found in 

 the experimental plots of the connnon white sweet clover 

 {MeJihtus nlha (L) Lam), a form wiiich produced an annual 

 root and died at the close of the season. 



During the spring of 1917 Mr. H. S. Coe of the U. S. Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, in a conversation about the white sweet 

 clover said he had found an annual form, and asked whether I 

 had ever observed one and whether 1' knew of one. In an ex- 

 amination of available literature, I was able to find but a single 

 description of such a clover. The Manuals of Gray^ and Britton- 

 describe only the biennial type of white sweet clover. The 

 genus Mel Hot us is described as annual and biennial in Cray's 

 Manual, in Britton and Brown's- Hustrated Flora, Bentham 

 and Hooker. 4 and Engler and Prantb. and in botanical works 

 in general. 



Engler and l^rantl list .1/. nifliouca Bieb. as annual, a white 

 sweet clover, marked in the description giveii in DeCandolle's 

 Prodromus'"' as ''annual with (piestioii." This sweet clover 

 found in southern Russia is descrilied as having a "testaceou^^ 

 seed'' whicli is not true of M. alba or its strains. The M. a' ha 

 var. is the most common tA"pe cultivated in the United States 

 geuei"ally. Compared with the biennial species it is less valuable 

 as a forage plant. 



The fact that a plant of the type of the biennial white sweet 

 clover {MelUotus alha) is an annual will be a distinct gain to 

 agTiculture. By scarifying the seed it may be sown in with 

 corn when this is "laid by", and thus help to fertilize the soil, 

 as well as producing forage in the fall. 



Professor H. D. Hughes' has called attention to this annual 

 white sweet clover, in several published notes'^ 



^Robinson, B. L., and Fernald, ^I. L., Grav's New ^Manual of Botany, 7 

 ed.. 510. 



"Britton, L., ilanual of the Flora of the Northern States and Canada. S 

 ed.. 5,38-539. 



^Britton, N. L., and Brown, A., Illustrated Flora of Northern United States 

 and Canada, 2-273. 



^Bentham, G., and Hooker. J. D., i. 487. 1862. 



•'■Engler, A., and PrantI, K., Die Natlirliclien Pflanzen Familien. Teil 3. 

 Abteilung 3. 247, 1894. 



"De Candolle. P.. Prodromus Systematis Naturali.s, .2. 186. 



'Hughes, H. D., Disctaver New Wliite Sweet Clover. The Alumnus of Iowa 

 State College, Nov., 1917, 77. Better Iowa, Oct. 8, 1917. 



^Field's Seed Sense, November, 1917, 14 [letter]. 



