158 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 



manure and plow it under the preceding year, then 

 plant a crop of corn and keep the crop absolutely 

 clean of weeds and grass so that no seeds will be 

 formed. This gives pretty clean land for alfalfa 

 sowing the succeeding year. Impossible to keep 

 corn land clean, say you? It is neither impossible 

 nor very difficult. On Woodland Farm it has been 

 found that about 5 plowings with two-horse culti- 

 vators followed with two goings through with one- 

 horse garden cultivators of the many shoveled type, 

 kept the corn almost absolutely clean, and men with 

 hoes rapidly completed the work. A good stand 

 of corn greatly helps here. 



Eradicating Fox-tail Grass. Fox-tail or pigeon 

 grass (Chaetochloa glauca) is one of the worst ene- 

 mies of alfalfa in all eastern America. It is an an- 

 nual grass that becomes very thick in young mead- 

 ows and sometimes in old ones. Mowing it off does 

 not prevent its going to seed, in fact mowing it off 

 only seems to make it grow thicker. It cannot be 

 eradicated by disking in new alfalfa fields. Take it all 

 in all it is the worst pest of alfalfa in the eastern 

 states. Crab grass is next to it, but crab grass does 

 not trouble where there is plenty of lime in the soil, 

 while fox-tail is no respecter of lime or anything 

 else. 



Fortunately fox-tail has its weak point; its seeds 

 do not live long in the soil but soon germinate there 

 and grow. On Woodland Farm we have kept a corn 

 field absolutely clean for one year, and next season 

 sown the land to alfalfa, with the result that we did 



