168 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 
relish either the hay or the green plant, but in time most ani- 
mals eat both with apparent relish, though always preferring 
grass and other legumes. 
Sweet clover seeds abundantly in its second year of growth 
and will thus occupy the land continuously if not destroyed by 
cultivation. It never makes a full stand except on lime land. 
Soil deficient in lime, but made up largely of clay, often pro- 
duces individual plants of thrifty growth, but I have never seen 
on such land a stand thick enough to be profitable. The chief 
value of melilotus is for the renovation of the stiff, waxy, lime 
soils of the central prairie regions of Alabama and Mississippi 
where the subsoil is a soft or rotten limestone. 
In Alabama yellow melilotus is not at all comparable in value 
with white melilotus. 
The yellow comes up earlier in winter, blooms in April, and 
is dead by June. It never attains the size of either top or root 
attained by sweet clover and hence is not equal as a renovating 
plant. Moreover, the bitter principle is much stronger in yellow 
melilotus, so strong indeed ag to taint the milk and butter made 
from it, a condition that rarely if ever occurs with white meli- 
lotus. 
Note the curious fact that sweet clover like alfalfa 
revels in lime land. I have seen it growing with 
great luxuriance in piles of crushed limestone rail- 
way ballast where one would hardly think any plant 
could find sustenance, but that railway ballast was 
of limestone and full of limestone dust. 
Use of Sweet Clover—Here would seem to be the 
correct use of melilotus, for making land ready for 
alfalfa. If it is land deficient in lime put on ground 
limestone enough to make it alkaline, or else use 
burned lime if the ground limestone can not be had. 
Then in case the land needs humus and fertility to 
be made ready for alfalfa, sow to melilotus for two 
years. There is no magic about melilotus probably 
aside from the magic of its bacteria, and it will 
grow the better for fertilization, so fertilize it with 
