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CHAPTER XVI. 

 ALL ABOUT ALFALFA. 



LFAI.FA is the greatest forage plant the world 

 has ever known, and should be a special crop 

 with every irrigation farmer. It is known 

 scientifically as Medicago sativa, its botanical 

 name. In the Spanish language it is alfalfa, while the 

 French, Swiss, German, and Canadian people call it 

 lucern. It is a leguminous perennial, and properly 

 belongs to the pea-vine family. It is often miscalled a 

 grass. Its term of existence has not been authentically 

 established, but it will last the average age of man, 

 and instead of depleting the soil it has a way, through 

 its root nodules, of constantly replenishing the soil 

 with the nitrogenous fertilizing elements of the atmos- 

 phere. 



The wTiter once met a ^vgnerable padre of Old 

 Mexico, who said his alfalfa patch had been planted 

 over two hundred years, had never been reseeded dur- 

 ing that time^ and had yielded four crops of hay regu- 

 larly every year. The history of this most wonderful 

 plant is somewhat shrouded in mystery, but the Grecian 

 historians tell us that it was brought from Media, in 

 Asia, to Greece, in Europe, during the reign of Darius, 

 about five hundred years before Christ. Its culture 

 extended to Rome, thence to the south of France, 

 where it has been a favorite forage plant. It grows 

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