IN THS DIFFERENT STATES 1 55 



VERMONT 



J. L. Hills, direaor of the station, writes: 

 "Alfalfa has hardly been given a sufficient trial to 

 determine absolutely whether it will be a success or 

 failure. About twelve years ago we tried it at some 

 forty-odd places throughout the state with uniform 

 failure. We have tried it several years at Burlington, 

 and have never been able to get a good stand except 

 at the present time, when we have a fairly good stand 

 of about three years' growth. A few weeks ago I 

 visited an excellent field about twenty miles south of 

 Burlington. This was upon a soil very well adapted 

 to it, being old orchard soil well drained. I think 

 the failures have, as a rule, come from poor choice of 

 soil, and more particularly from winter-killing. I am 

 inclined to believe that such success as alfalfa has 

 attained in this state was due largely to character of the 

 soil, to good preparation of the seed-bed, and to careful 

 attention the first year. ' ' 



WASHINGTON 



F. M. Lowden, Walla Walla : "In twenty -two 

 years I have had an experience with from one to four 

 hundred acres of alfalfa, on 'bottom,' 'second bottom,' 

 and up land, with clay, sand, and loam soils, with sub- 

 soil of hard-pan and strong alkali from eighteen to 

 twenty inches below the surface, and water at depth 

 of eighteen to twenty feet. The soil is seldom moist 

 all the way down, the dry soil beginning five to eight 

 feet below the surface and ending within two or three 

 feet of the water. After plowing deep and harrowing 

 well, I sow in the spring, late enough to miss frost, 



