130 CLOVERS 



being ascertained that it will grow on a great variety 

 of soils, providing they are reasonably fertile, free from 

 acidity, sufficiently porous below to carry away water 

 with reasonable quickness, and not underlaid with 

 hard pan or a subsoil so tenacious that it is almost 

 impervious to water. 



The best soils for alfalfa are those of the Western 

 mountain States, and in these the deposit soils of 

 the river valleys stand among the foremost. These 

 soils are usually of much depth. Many of them 

 have water underneath, and the subsoil is usually 

 so porous that the roots can go far down in them, 

 such is the character of nearly all the bottom land 

 west of the Mississippi. But in nearly all of the 

 mountain region of the West, from Banff in British 

 Columbia to Mexico, alfalfa will grow well under 

 irrigation, or in the absence of irrigation, if ground 

 water is not too distant from the surface. In this 

 region alfalfa grows more vigorously and more per- 

 sistently than in almost any other portion of the 

 United States. 



In regions where alfalfa is not dependent upon ir- 

 rigation, the best soils probably are deep, rich cal- 

 careous loams, clay or sandy, and underlaid with 

 what may be termed a mild or reasonably porous 

 clay subsoil. With such soils the plants may be in 

 no way influenced by sheet water below, as on some 

 of these in Nebraska, for instance, such water is 

 fully 150 feet below the surface. These soils are 

 usually possessed of abundant food supplies to 

 nourish the plants, and the roots can go far down 

 into the subsoils to gather food and moisture. Such 



