248 CLOVERS 



Potatoes and sweet corn, for instance, may be thus 

 grown. 



Preparing the Soil. — In preparing the seed-bed 

 for crimson clover, the aim should be to secure fine- 

 ness of pulverization near the surface and moistness 

 in the same. The former is greatly important, be- 

 cause of the aid which it renders in securing the lat- 

 ter at a season when moisture is often lacking in 

 the soil. As it is rather grown on soils deficient 

 in humus than on those plentifully supplied with 

 the same, fineness in the seed-bed is not so important 

 as it is with some classes of prairie soils. 



In starting the seed, drought is the chief hin- 

 drance to be overcome in the North, owing to the 

 season at which the seed must be sown; hence, the 

 aim should be to begin preparing the seed-bed as 

 long as possible before the sowing of the seed. The 

 preparation called for will be influenced by the kind 

 of soil, the crop last grown upon it and also the 

 weather; hence, the process of preparing the seed- 

 bed will vary. The judgment must determine 

 whether the land should be plowed, or disked and 

 pulverized, or simply harrowed. After potatoes and 

 other garden crops, harrowing may suffice; after 

 certain grain crops on soils not too stiff, disking 

 may suffice; but where much trash is to be buried, 

 plowing would be necessary, and when the ground is 

 at all cloddy, the roller should be freely used. In 

 corn fields the last cultivation will make a suitable 

 seed-bed, and the same is sometimes true in cotton 

 fields. 



To grow good crops of crimson clover, it is neces- 



