SUMMARY OF ALFALFA SOWIN(. 505 
before made above $60 worth of hay per acre, be- 
cides a lot kept at home for feeding a dairy herd. 
Lest one might think this behavior of the alfalfa 
on the lime-clay accidental, I will say that there were 
other places in the field where ditches had been dug 
to great depth and the pebbles and subsoil thrown 
out; wherever these appeared the alfalfa survived. 
We had not supposed that the field was in need of 
lime, since there is so much of it down only about 
16", but we now see that could we plow deep enough 
to turn up this lime-impregnated subsoil we could 
greatly benefit the field. With a deep-tilling plow 
we can reach a part of this material, and shall do so. 
Phosphorus for Old Alfalfa Fields —One part of 
the field at the home farm was not mowed the fourth 
time in the fall of 1911, the reason being that the 
growth was too poor to warrant it. This part did 
not winterkill and there was a thick, even stand. It 
is a corner of the field remote from barns. In our 
father’s day it had little manure; since his death 
it has had little. Studying this corner at the time of 
the first cutting, I was disappointed in its growth. 
The alfalfa was too short. Something was lacking. 
What was it? J suspected a deficiency of phosphorus. 
We had made a practice of going over our alfalfa 
meadows with acid phosphate each year, allowing 
about 300 pounds to the acre. This corner had for 
some reason missed getting its proper share. The 
first cutting of hay would have satisfied some; it 
made more than a ton to the acre, yet to my eye 
something was wrong. 
