White sweetclover, known also as bee-clover, honeyclover, galy- 

 gumber, and as Bokhara, Siberian, and white melilot, is a, robust 

 biennial herb belonging to the pea family (Leguminosae} . In this 

 immense family it is classified in the clover tribe (Trifolieae^ 

 sandwiched between the true clovers (Trlfoliwm) and the alfalia 

 genus (Medicago}. 



White sweetclover is native to the temperate regions of Europe 

 and Asia as far east as Tibet. 1 2 Its first authentic record in the 

 United States was in 1T39, 1 3 when Dr. John Clayton collected this 

 plant in Virginia. However, its actual cultivation in this country 

 dates from 1856, when Prof. Henry Tutwiler of Green Springs 

 Academy, Ala., established a stand with seed obtained from Chile. 

 White sweetclover has attained the status of a, major farm crop 

 in the United States and Canada only since about 1900. 



Indications are that white sweetclover might do well, where soil 

 arid precipitation conditions are favorable, 4 for reseeding certain 

 abandoned farmlands which should revert to range, in the Pacific 

 Northwest, western Montana, and limitedly elsewhere. Good results 

 were obtained from planting this species on burned-over forest lands 

 near Sandpoint, Idaho, 5 at elevations of from 2,000 to 2,500 feet, 

 where the annual precipitation averages over 20 inches; it was one 

 of the few forages studied which increased in density from year to 

 year. Unlike many grasses, white sweetclover does not cure on the 

 stem for fall and winter grazing. On experimentally reseeded range 

 areas in Utah and Oregon having about 20 inches of rainfall a good 

 stand was secured, but it failed to reestablish itself and in from 

 3 to 5 years the stand was practically gone. 



Growing on a wide variety of farm soils, from cemented clays and 

 gravels to poor sands, white sweetclover exhibits much latitude in 

 physical site requirements. However, it will not succeed on acid 

 soils, unless limed, or on very wet soils. 1 6 It can be grown on both 

 the adobe and granitic soils of the Pacific coast as well as on heavy 

 black hardpan, prairie loams, newly exposed heavy clays, and on the 

 poor, infertile soils of abandoned farms in the more humid areas. 

 The species grows luxuriantly on fertile, well-drained, limy soils, 

 and also flourishes on lands with a shallow water table,, that are 

 unsuitable for alfalfa production. It is one of the most alkali- 

 resistant of our economic crops, being so tolerant as to survive on 

 strongly alkaline bottom seepage. 3 



White sweetclover is adapted for cultivation in a wide variety of 

 climatic conditions and can be grown under greater environmental 

 extremes than any of the true cultivated clovers. If the stand is 

 comparatively dense, it very seldom winter-kills. Although heavy 

 damage resulted in Montana during an unusually severe winter 



1 Coe, H. S. SWEET CLOVEK : GHOWING THE CROP. U. S. Dept. Agr. Farmers' Bull. 797, 

 35 pp., illus. 1917. 



2 Westgate, J. M., and Vinall, H. N. SWEET CLOVER. U. S. Dept. Agr. Farmers' Bull. 

 485, 39 pp., illus. 1912. 



3 Piper, C. V. FORAGE PLANTS AND THEIR CULTURE. Rev., 671 pp., illus. New York. 

 1924. 



*Forsling C. L., and Dayton, W. A. ARTIFICIAL RESEEDING ON WESTERN MOUNTAIN 

 RANGE LANDS. U. S. Dept. Agr. Cire. 178, 48 pp., illus. 1931. 



6 Christ, J. H. RESEEDING BURNED-OVER LANDS IN NORTHERN IDAHO. Idaho Agr. Expt. 

 Sta. Bull. 201, 28 pp., illus. 1934. 



Pieters, A. J. SWEET CLOVER. U. S. Dept. Agr. Leaflet 23, 8 pp., illus. [1928.] 



