120 One Thousand Questions in Agriculture 



Where Alfalfa is Grown. 



In zuhat comities is alfalfa most successfully grozvn? By this I mean 

 zvhere three crops of hay may he had each grotving season. Also, will 

 corn grow good paying crops in same sections^ 



Alfalfa is grown all through the valleys and foothills of interior 

 California; also to a certain extent in coast valleys. On suitable 

 lands, three crops can sometimes be secured without irrigation, while 

 twice or three times as many cuttings are secured on irrigated lands 

 where the frost-free season is particularly long. According to the 

 last census, we are growing alfalfa on 19,104 farms with a total 

 acreage of 484,098. The total value of the product is over $13,000,000. 

 Corn is widely grown, but is small as compared with alfalfa. It is 

 grown in alfalfa districts and in coast valleys where there is not 

 much done with alfalfa. 



Sowing Alfalfa. 



What is the proper time to sow alfalfa? Some advocate fall and 

 others spring solving. What seasons are given for each solving? 



We shall undoubtedly soon get to sowing alfalfa all the year 

 round except in the short season of sharp frosts and cold wet ground 

 in November, December and January. If you can get a good start in 

 September and October, all right; if not, wait until February and 

 March, according to the season. Where it is never very cold or wet, 

 sow whenever moisture is right. There never can be any rule about 

 it, for localities will dififer. 



Foxtail and Alfalfa. 



JVill foxtail choke out and exterminate alfalfa? Some fields look as 

 though the foxtail liad crowded the alfalfa out, but I hold that the alfalfa 

 died from some other cause and the foxtail merely took its place. 



Foxtail will not choke out alfalfa, providing soil and moisture 

 conditions are right for the latter, and a good stand of plant has 

 been secured. If anything is wrong with the alfalfa, the foxtail will 

 be on the alert to take advantage of it. You will always have fox- 

 tail with you, and considerable quantities of it, perhaps, in the first 

 cutting, because foxtail will grow at a lower temperature than al- 

 falfa, and, therefore, will keep very busy during the rainy season, 

 while the alfalfa is more or less dormant, but as the heat increases, 

 if the soil is good and moisture ample, the alfalfa will put the fox- 

 tail out of sight until the following winter invites it to make an- 

 other aggressive growth. Therefore, we answer that alfalfa does 

 not die from foxtail, but from some condition unfavorable to the 

 alfalfa, which must be sought in the soil, or in the moisture supply, 

 or traced back to bad seed, and a poor stand at the beginning. 



Which Alfalfa is Best? 



/ have in Stanislaus county ten acres of Arabian alfalfa, which was 

 sown the first week in April this year. It was clipped in July and irri- 



