I 82 CLOVERS 



The seed crop is sometimes cut with the mower 

 and raked into winrows, and in some instances put 

 up into cocks. When it is handled thus, the aim 

 should be to do the work, as far as this may be 

 practicable, in the early and late hours of the day, 

 but not, of course, while much dew is on the crop. 

 Sometimes the seed is drawn from the winrows to 

 the thresher; in other instances from the cocks, and 

 in yet other instances it is stacked before being 

 threshed, a work that calls for the exercise of much 

 care in the storing of the crop, lest the seed should 

 be injured by heating in the stack. This method of 

 harvesting is usually attended with much loss of 

 seed. 



There is probably no better way of harvesting 

 alfalfa than to cut it with the self-rake reaper or 

 the binder. The loose sheaves dry quickly, and 

 when lifted, the aim is to carry them directly to the 

 thresher. Less seed, it is considered, will be lost in 

 this way than by the other mode of harvesting given 

 above, and the work is more expeditiously done. 

 But owing to the difficulty in securing a thresher to 

 thresh the seed, it is sometimes found necessary to 

 stack the crop, but in areas where irrigation is prac- 

 ticed such stacking is seldom necessary. 



The seed is frequently threshed with the ordi- 

 nary threshing machine, but in many instances 

 it is also threshed with a clover huller. The 

 huller does the work less quickly, but probably, 

 on the whole, more perfectly. Threshing machines, 

 with or even without certain adjustments in the 

 arrangement of the teeth in the cylinder and 



