160 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



that they have got to deliver the goods or something will 

 happen in the seed business. There are hundreds of thousands 

 of bushels of Asiatic alfalfa seed landed on our eastern United 

 States, and of course it gets to you farmers first, and it gets to 

 the Nebraska and Iowa farmer last. Much of it is useless; it 

 is too old. So I think it is a vital problem to have some man 

 like the Farm Bureau man to put it up to the seedsmen to 

 deliver good seed. I believe you can get the seedsmen to do 

 this for you. While we could buy seed for $7.80 a bushel, the 

 men who got the best crops in our section paid $14 a bushel. 

 They could afford to send a man to Montana and buy seed. 

 We bought $2,000 worth of seed from one dealer. One of the 

 Philadelphia dealers said the other day, "I guess the alfalfa 

 business is a failure because I sold less seed this year than I 

 have in ten years." The seedsmen have got to wake up, and 

 they must tell us where they get their seed and wdiere it w^as 

 grown. 



Professor Foord. ]Mr. Westgate, from the United States 

 Department, told me three or four years ago that there were 

 5,000 acres of seed alfalfa in Ontario. Mr. Westgate had been 

 through the province and knew what he was talking about. 

 We have had excellent results from seed obtained from that 

 section. Their winters are as severe as ours. In the early 

 days of drought agitation we w^re told alfalfa would grow on 

 sand. Now, tie together -what Mr. Cromwell has said with 

 the picture of the manure spreader. If you don't you will make 

 a failure of it. Alfalfa wants some fertility. It is a weak, 

 sickly little plant when it starts. When raising it experi- 

 mentally in the southern part of the State, where you have a 

 lot of sandy soil, you must have that manure there to stimulate 

 the bacteria and to get fertility until w^e get it started. I was 

 interested two years ago, in walking up from the pier down off 

 Cape Cod, to see right beside the road a great big bunch of 

 sweet clover, and just beyond that, right on the seashore, they 

 were mowing alfalfa. That is on sandy soil. Within 30 feet 

 of the seashore, with the northeastern exposure, coming right 

 down to the shore, was alfalfa planted. I had some friends in 

 that cottage, and in the fall I took some spears from that 

 alfalfa plant that had seeded, but not fully ripened, and I just 



