122 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 



near his own barn. Then eastern lands sell at com- 

 paratively low prices; all along the Atlantic sea- 

 board land can be bought for from $40 to $75 per 

 acre that will, with proper preparation, grow from 

 three to seven tons of alfalfa hay a year. Some 

 western men are seeing this and coming back to the 

 neglected Atlantic states, and with splendid west- 

 ern faith and enthusiasm are building alfalfa soils 

 there and reaping rich profits therefrom. I have in 

 mind very many instances where liming lands has 

 brought alfalfa after it had repeatedly failed before 

 the lime was applied. 



Effects of Lime. When God made soils He often 

 made them by grinding up rock masses, either by 

 use of glacial icebergs or by the grinding action of 

 rivers. When these rock masses were of limestone, 

 the result was a limestone soil filled with particles 

 great and small of ground limestone or carbonate of 

 lime. In some soils there are enormous amounts of 

 this material. In some very fertile soils of northern 

 Illinois, taking the top five feet there will be found 

 in one acre as much as 500 tons of carbonate of 

 lime. Such soils are always rich and productive. 

 They are always natural alfalfa soils, provided they 

 are well drained. Along most rivers the alluviums 

 are pretty well stored with carbonate of lime, thus 

 one sees the river bottoms growing alfalfa well when 

 the near lying uplands are too sour to grow it at all. 

 It is because of the greater amount of lime in these 

 alluvial soils, that and the better drainage and fer- 

 tility all around, that mark them as alfalfa lands. 



