SUMMARY OF ALFALFA SOWING. 513 



the crowns; it seemed not to do so. We harrowed 

 the alfalfa in two directions, tearing up every inch 

 of the surface soil, destroying grass and making a 

 soil mulch. The result was little less than marvel- 

 ous. Even the old alfalfa weakened and thinned by 

 the previous year's bad treatment came to life in 

 large part, thickened up by stooling and seemed too 

 good to break. I do not know what place the tractor 

 has in farm economy; its weight may preclude its 

 use for spring plowing, but it has evidently a great 

 field of use on an alfalfa farm. It will plow in the 

 fall, using the deep tilling plows; it will with ease 

 keep the fields in garden-like tilth, free from grasses 

 and weeds. In the South, on the prairie lands, this 

 combination should have an especially good field 

 and result in great good. In fact, the advent of this 

 broad-sweeping alfalfa harrow with the tractor to 

 draw it seems to me to mark the final completion of 

 the necessary means to alfalfa growing in the region 

 east of the Missouri Eiver. It should be of nearly 

 equal use west of that line. 



The Bierwagen Method, or the Buried Crown in 

 Alfalfa. Daniel Bierwagen is a picturesque individ- 

 ual in Stanley Co., S. D. From his own observation 

 and experience he has evolved a new system of al- 

 falfa culture, especially applicable to cold and arid 

 regions. This is the system of the buried crown. In 

 studying the native legumes of his region, he ob- 

 served that they grew thriftily where the wash of 

 the hills continually tended to deposit silt, and more 

 deeply bury the crowns. Acting on this hint, he 



