W124 

 (leaf 2) 



as a nectar source, since it blooms earlier, and may be used to supple- 

 ment white sweetclover in bee pastures. 7 



Because of its withstanding heavy usage and its production of seed 

 close to the ground, yellow sweetclover sometimes becomes objec- 

 tionable in mixed meadows, increasing too much at the expense of 

 other desirable species. 7 8 However, these characteristics may be ad- 

 vantageous when a permanent pasture is desired as, for example, on 

 a badly depleted area. White sweetclover eclipses its yellow-flowered 

 relative in acreage throughout the United States, largely because of 

 its greater yield. Yellow sweetclover is less popular for hay than its 

 white sister, which commonly yields 1 ton more hay per acre, 6 al- 

 though the former is better liked in some places because of its fine 

 stems, which make a superior hay. Like the other species of sweet- 

 clover, yellow sweetclover is an excellent plant, where it can be 

 grown, for improving soils because of the nitrogen-fixing bacteria 

 in the root-nodules and because the roots decay rapidly after the 

 death of the plant, thus adding humus to the soil. Yellow sweet- 

 clover, however, is inferior in this respect to the white-flowered bien- 

 nial because of its smaller root growth. 9 The mature seeds of yellow 

 sweetclover are distinguished from those of white sweetclover by 

 their dark greenish yellow color and the purple flecks. 



In addition to M. officinalis, two other yellow-flowered species of 

 Melilotus are in cultivation. Annual yellow sweetclover (M. 

 in'dica), also known as sourclover and King Island melilot, a 

 native of Eurasia found on ballast and waste places along the At- 

 lantic seaboard and Gulf Coast of North America, and locally in the 

 interior, has become an abundant weed in farming areas of Cali- 

 fornia and the Southwest. Wooton and Standley 10 report that no 

 weed is more common in alfalfa fields of New Mexico. It is a 

 winter annual, averaging 1% to 3 feet in height, and has been ex- 

 tensively grown in California as a green manure crop in the citrus 

 orchards. 2 The species is useful for pasturage and hay in the 

 warmer sections of the United States but useless in the North. 

 Daghestan sweetclover (M. suave' olens) is a yellow-flowered bien- 

 nial resembling white sweetclover in growth habit. It has recently 

 been introduced into America and is showing promise in the Dakotas 

 and Minnesota. 2 



The sweetclovers, sometimes called melilots, include approximately 

 20 to 25 species of annual or biennial herbs native in Europe, Asia, 

 and Africa but now widely distributed throughout the temperate 

 and subtropical regions. Some species are valuable forage plants 

 and have attained importance under cultivation; others are merely 



2 5 See footnotes on preceding page. 



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

 485, 39 pp., illus. 1912. 



8 Clark. S. P. SWEET CLOVER IN ARIZONA. Ariz. Agr. Expt. Sta. Circ. 34, 7 pp. 1921. 



9 Coe, H. S. SWEET CLOVER : GROWING THE CROP. U. S. Dept. Agr. Farmers' Bull. 797, 

 35 pp., illus. 1917. 



10 Wooton. E. O., and Standley. P. C. FLORA OF NEW MEXICO. U. S. Natl. Mus., Con- 

 trib. U. S. Natl. Herbarium 19, 794 pp. 1915. 



