26 CLOVER CULTURE. 



is difficult to cure and is largely rejected by live stock. These 

 objections do not apply where it is not desirable to secure a 

 hay crop. Many farmers are so situated that they prefer to 

 grow both in separate fields, the medium red for hay, after- 

 math and fertility, and the mammoth for securing with rea- 

 sonable certainty a crop of seed. In this case they sow timothy 

 with the mammoth and cut the first crop for seed, sometimes 

 mowing or pasturing it off until the first weeks of June for the 

 purpose of getting rid of the lower foot of the stalk and also 

 for the purpose of securing more abundant stooling. A crop 

 of seed is then taken about the ist of September and the after- 

 math of timothy and clover is allowed to grow for the pur- 

 pose ot pasture. About two-thirds of the stalks of the mam- 

 moth clover die out the year after sowing, and the result is 

 usually a very heavy crop the next year, about two-thirds 

 timothy and one-third clover. The clover being at its best 

 at the same time as the timothy, the crop of hay resulting is 

 of a very fine quality, and comes in at a time when the best 

 conditions are usually present for curing it in its best estate. 

 It is very important, however, when growing timothy for 

 seed to secure seed free from admixture with the common 

 red and to sow it on soil not self-seeded with the latter 

 variety. 



In sections of the country where the insect enemies of 

 clover are abundant it is advisable to discontinue the growth 

 of common red for a time and- take the mammoth in prefer- 

 ence, with all its disadvantages. All the insect pests with 

 which we are acquainted that infest the blossoms of clover, 

 produce two broods in the season, the first at the time of the 

 first bloom of red clover, and the second at the time of the sec- 

 ond bloom. By using the mammoth the fly of these pests 

 has no opportunity to deposit its eggs, and hence no second 

 crop is possible on that field. This is likely to be a very im- 

 portant consideration in the West when the growth of clover 

 is fully established. 



While the mammoth is far inferior to the medium red as 

 a hay crop, and therefore we do not advise its cultivation 

 where a hay crop is the main object, it has very important ad- 

 vantages to the farmer who has exhausted the fertility of hist 

 land by long years of cultivation in wheat, corn, oats vrflax, 

 and who is not in shape either to buy live stock or to provide 

 the shelter necessary to keep them at a profit. In such cases 

 as this we advise the sowing of mammoth clover with every 

 crop of spring grain, even though it be the intention to plow 



