28 CLOVERS 



medium red, mammoth and crimson varieties will 

 usually suffice. Half the quantity of alsike will be 

 enough, and one-third the quantity of the small 

 white, or a little more than that. Whether alfalfa is 

 grown for seed, for hay or for pasture, about the 

 ■same amounts of seed are used; that is, 15 to 20 

 pounds per acre. When sown with nurse crops and 

 simply to improve the soil, it is customary to sow 

 small rather than large quantities of seed, and for 

 the reason that the hazard of failure to secure a 

 stand every season is too considerable to justify the 

 outlay. From 4 to 5 pounds per acre are frequently 

 sown and of the medium or mammoth variety. 



When the mammoth and medium varieties of 

 clover are sown for hay with one or two kinds of 

 grass only, it is not common to sow more than 

 6 to 8 pounds of either per acre. The maximum 

 amount of the seed of the alsike required when 

 thus sown with grasses may be set down at 

 5 pounds per acre. These three varieties are chiefly 

 used for such mixtures. With more varieties of 

 grass in the mixtures, the quantities of clover seed 

 used will decrease. When clovers are sown with 

 mixtures intended for permanent pastures, it would 

 not be possible to name the amounts of seed to sow 

 without knowing the grasses used also, but it may 

 be said that, as a rule, in those mixtures, the clovers 

 combined seldom form more than one-third of the 

 seed used. 



The seeds of some varieties of clover are less than 

 one-third of the size of other varieties. This, there- 

 fore, affects proportionately, or at least approxi- 



