220 MEADOWS AND PASTURES 



Simple Test for Lime in Soils. The old litmus paper 

 test for 'sour soils is hardly conclusive to the alfalfa 

 grower, since it does not tell enough. Alfalfa is not 

 content with a soil that is simply neutral; it revels in a 

 soil fairly alkaline with lime and there keeps its most 

 perfect health. Fortunately the test for carbonate of 

 lime is a simple one. Muriatic acid, a cheap chemical 

 obtainable at any druggist's, when poured on soil having 

 in it a large amount of carbonate of lime, will vigorously 

 effervesce. The bubbles given off are bubbles of car- 

 bonic acid gas. If your alfalfa is sickly and yellow, 

 if sorrel comes in and alfalfa goes out, test that land 

 and the subsoil for effervescence. Ten to one you will 

 find nowhere any of it. Then begin seeking a source of 

 carbonate of lime cheap enough so that you can afford 

 to use it in large amounts, or else forsake alfalfa for 

 alsike clover and redtop. 



Fertile Soils for Alfalfa. Alfalfa also revels in a fer- 

 tile soil. I have found no plant of use to men that 

 does not like a fertile soil, but alfalfa more than most 

 revels in sufficient plant foo.d. It likes abundant potas- 

 sium, phosphorus, some humus and much carbonate of 

 lime. Withal, it is a famous soil-enricher; its nodule- 

 bearing roots gather more free nitrogen from the air 

 than those of almost any other legume, but it will not 

 enrich very poor soils as well as will vetches, for exam- 

 ple, or cowpeas. It likes a soil on which man has worked, 

 although it finds in nature on the western plains soils 

 that suit it to perfection. In the older eastern states 

 it revels in rich, loamy, drained, sweet soils, full of 

 humus, full of beneficent bacteria. I have often remarked 



