290 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 
have ditch banks covered with sod. This prevents 
their washing away from too great heads of water 
and facilitates irrigation. Brome grass is good for 
this purpose, or Kentucky bluegrass. 
Alfalfa Growing and Irrigation in Mexico—The 
following letter from Alf Kessler, once of Utah, 
now of southern Coahuila, Mexico, is interesting as 
showing the progress of alfalfa culture in our sister 
Republic: 
When I was very young, in the small seventies, about the first 
things thal happened that made an impression on my mind were 
the Chicago fire, the killing of Jim Fisk and the planting and 
growing of alfalfa in Utah (and as everybody knows, Utah was 
the first territory to be successfully reclaimed by irrigation). I 
have been in the thick of the conflict from the beginning to the 
present time, and since I have become grown, have traveled all 
over the principal western country from Kansas City to the 
Pacific, and from northern Alberta to Southern Coahuila, Mex., 
where I am at present engaged in raising alfalfa. I have care- 
fully studied alfalfa conditions wherever I have been and this 
beats them all for raising the weed, as the natives call it. 
First in selecting a locality for raising alfalfa here, be sure 
that you have plenty of water; then pick land that is on the 
order of a nice deep sandy loam with not too much alkali; it 
all has enough lime; then plow it good and deep, level nicely, 
and be sure it is level to save future trouble, but should have 
a gentle slope, and gow 16 lbs. of seed per acre broadcast with 
machine. ‘This we find sufficient. Then we irrigate in the fur- 
row system. To make these furrows we have what we call a 
drum roller. The drum part is about 36” high, and with two 
plows (Center Busters) 26” apart from center to center, at- 
tached just ahead of the roller. It has also two flanges the 
same distance apart which fit the plow furrow and leaves your 
small drills or ditches 26” apart.up and down over the whole 
field. Then we cross-ditch the field and leave these small ditches, 
or irrigation furrows, 600’ long and you are ready for the water. 
This takes some patience for the first few irrigations, or until 
the alfalfa is up about 6” high and well started all your trouble 
is at an end. In your first few irrigations be careful and not 
use too much water, in fact, just as little as will run through 
