5 8 CLOVERS 



higher, even as high as 4 feet in some instances, but 

 when they grow much higher than the average 

 given, the crop usually lodges. The leaves are nu- 

 merous, and many of them have very frequently, if 

 not, indeed, always, a whitish mark in the center, 

 resembling a horseshoe. The tap roots go down 

 deeply into the soil. Usually they penetrate the same 

 to about 2 feet, but in some instances, as when sub- 

 soils are open and well stored with accessible food, 

 they, go down to the depth of 5 or 6 feet. The tap 

 roots are numerously branched, and the branches ex- 

 tend in all directions. When they are short, as they 

 must needs be in very stiff subsoils and on thin land 

 underlaid with hard soil, the branches become about 

 as large as the tap roots. It has been computed that 

 the weight of the roots in the soil is about equal to 

 the weight of the stem and leaves. 



Medium red clover is ordinarily biennial in its 

 habit of growth, but under some conditions it is 

 perennial. Usually in much of the Mississippi 

 basin it is biennial, especially on prairie soils. On 

 the clay loam soils of Ontario, Ohio, Michigan, Wis- 

 consin, Indiana and some other States, it is essen- 

 tially biennial, but many of the plants will survive 

 for a longer period. In the mountain valleys in the 

 Northwestern States, and on the Pacific slope west 

 of the Cascade Mountains, it is perennial. Medium 

 red clover meadows in these have been cut for sev- 

 eral successive years without re-seeding the crop. 

 The duration of this plant is also more or less in- 

 fluenced by pasturing as compared with cutting for 

 'seed. Grazing the plants has the effect of prolong- 



