LUCEFNE IN NATAL. 31 



PREPARATION OF LAND. 



There is nothing particular to be said under this head. A 



very fine seed bed is necessary, and the same cultivation which is 



ordinarily done for any small seeds will cf course do for lucerne, 



only, as the crop is such a permanent one it is worth while going 



to a little more trouble. 



At the Weenen Irrigation Settlement I have seen land pre- 

 pared for sowing in a manner which left very little room for 

 improvement, and lucerne farmers can get full information on this 

 point from Weenen settlers, or from other parts of this book. 



While, however, the preparation of the land for lucerne seed 

 differs little, if at all, from that for any line seed, the matter of the 

 levelling of the ground before sowing is of the utmost importance. 

 In the first place, the more perfect the levelling the better will the 

 mowing machine do its work, and the closer will it cut a very 

 important point. Again, the more even the land is, and the freer 

 from lumps and hillocks, the more easily and thoroughly can it be 

 irrigated with a given supply of water. It will be said that this 

 equally applies to any other crop, and this is so, but whereas with 

 annual crops the yearly cultivation, ploughing and harrowing in 

 preparing the land for the next crop will bring the land into a 

 more level condition year by year until it is perfect, with lucerne 

 once planted there is no chance of levelling hillocks, or doing any- 

 thing to the surface ; therefore, that which in the case of other 

 cr ps can be spread over years, must, as regards lucerne, be done 

 as much as possible before sowing. Very great attention is paid 

 to this point in the Cape Colony. At Weenen I saw the ground 

 being levelled by a heavy railway rail being drawn over it, a team 

 being hitched to either end, and this appeared to me to be a most 

 effective way of doing the work. 



TIME OF PLANTING. 



In the districts where Income has been grown s;> far.jApril is 

 decided upon as the best month for sowing or drilling, and it is 

 found that only by sowing about this time of the year can a good 

 stand be got. I saw a field which was sown in January which 

 was a perfect failure, while some adjacent fields sown in April 

 were looking splendid and would crop by the following Septem- 

 ber or October. For untried districts it is impossible to say which 

 is the best time to plant or sow. I have heard of some January 

 sowing on our coast lands which did very well. In America I 

 find, on reference to books on the subject, that sowings are always 

 made either in the early spring or late autumn. 



METHOD OF SEEDING. 



Whore the land is fairly clean, sowing broadcast is to 'bs much 

 preferred to planting in drills, as it covers the ground more quickly 



