292 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 



forty days after the alfalfa gets into the producing stage. A 

 mistake may be made and too much water given it. In that 

 case it will stop growing, turn yellow and have small brown 

 spots on the leaves. Stop irrigating; cut once in eight or ten 

 days for two or three times; irrigate quickly and not let the 

 water stay on too long and it will come out all right again. 



We have about 400 acres in alfalfa here and it is doing fine 

 except where we have dry spells and run short of water. We 

 have had some of the leading men of the Republic here to look 

 at our work, besides Prof. Alfred Burbank of California and 

 others. They all congratulate us on our success, and have no 

 fault to find. In curing the hay, we cut it one day, rake and 

 cock it the next, then leave it in the field to cure a day or two 

 according to the weather. We put it in the stack just a little 

 moist and use a little salt, about 10 Ibs. per ton. This keeps 

 it a nice green color, and it holds its leaves when baling. But 

 should the weather be damp or misty, we put it in the stack 

 dry. 



These Mexicans all want to irrigate under the contour sys- 

 tem, but by so doing they flood the entire surface of the ground, 

 and the sun is so hot here that the land bakes hard so that the 

 young plants cannot come through, or very few of them. Then 

 they want to continue ponding the water, which should always 

 be avoided, for the hot sun soon makes the water warm enough 

 to scald the plants and kill them, or the water stands too long 

 and drowns them, and turns the meadow into grass and weeds 

 and then they say, the peons, "We don't want alfalfa anyway." 

 But people here with energy do want alfalfa, and everything 

 else. 



About here this alfalfa will grow 36" in thirty days, and start 

 to bloom nicely if cut at that stage. It can be cut eight or nine 

 times a year, but if let stand a little longer or until it gets a 

 little more firm it will have more food value, and produce more 

 tons of dry hay. By doing this it can be cut easily six times 

 a year, and the plants can rest through the months of Decem- 

 ber, January and February. In the first instance we cut a little 

 over a ton, and the second about two tons per acre, each cut- 

 ting. The hay is baled on the ranch. We have an engine and 

 steel press, and the hay is sold in Torreon, Monterey and the 

 different cities and is usually worth about $40 or $50 per ton 

 (silver) by the car load, but recently it brought $75, single ton 

 at Filipinas. 



