DISKING AND CULTIVATING. 255 
Disk with Care.—Disking of alfalfa must be done 
with care and discrimination. If alfalfa roots are 
cut off by a disk harrow or any other instrument 
the plant dies. Old and tough roots are not in much 
danger of being cut off. Young alfalfa, with more 
slender roots, is easily enough injured or killed. 
Thus the disks should not be sharp as knife edges 
and should be set straight enough not to cut off the 
crowns. It is well for the owner of the field to drive 
the disk. Dig up the land as thoroughly as you 
please, but do not cut off many crowns. One may 
disk and immediately cross-disk in early spring, 
burying up the alfalfa crowns somewhat, and no 
harm will result as they will come through pretty 
soon. After this disking I think it much of a local 
question whether one should disk more or not. If 
blue grass has run in, or any perennial grass, it may 
be wise to dig it out or it may be wiser to turn it all 
under, plant corn, then re-seed. 
Prevention of Grass Best—As a matter of fact, a 
dollar spent in buying carbonate of lime and phos- 
phorus, with drainage, will do more toward keeping 
weeds and grass out of alfalfa than two dollars 
worth of labor spent in disking. Where plantains 
come and weedy growths the soil is wrong; remedy 
that and the alfalfa will smother all else. Where 
crab grass troubles, as it does in the South, an abun- 
dant supply of carbonate of lime in the soil will 
make the alfalfa too much for it, unless perhaps it 
may come very late in the season, when it is not 
worth noticing. 
