Thirty-fourth Annual Convention. ^^^ 



lime should generally be made several months before the seed is 

 sown. A good practice for spring seeding is to plow the lime 

 under the fall before. With our present knowledge we would 

 recommend the use of about a ton per acre of air slaked lime. 

 Cheap lime for this purpose can be secured from almost any lime 

 kiln, as there is always more or less waste in the form of screen- 

 ings that cannot be sold as quick lime. Some kiln operators will 

 furnish this waste lime for the cost of loading it. For use on the 

 soil this material is as valuable as anything that can be secured, 

 and when compared with ground limestone it is worth practically 

 twice as much, since it furnishes practically double the amount of 

 actual lime. 



Soil Preparation and Seeding. 

 Alfalfa cannot be successfully established on ground that 15 

 infested with weed seeds. This is another of the things of which 

 we are absolutely sure. Young alfalfa is very sensitive to the 

 presence of weeds, and there are very few cases where it will not 

 be crowded down and out sooner or later if weeds are permitted 

 to grow, and they surely will grow if there are any live seeds 

 near the surface of the ground. Trouble with weeds, especially 

 in spring seeding, has been the most potent cause of failure to 

 secure satisfactory results with alfalfa in Indiana. Few people 

 realize how full of weed seeds the ground really is, even where 

 careful cultivation has been the rule. A corn field, for example, 

 may be perfectly free of weeds in the fall after a season of care- 

 ful cultivation, but next spring, when the ground is either plowed 

 or deeply stirred up to properly prepare it for the next crop, a 

 fresh lot of weed seeds is brought near the surface. With most 

 crops these might not be particularly noticed, but if alfalfa is 

 sown they are bound to get in its way. The common Foxtail is 

 by far the most troublesome weed that we have to deal with in 

 this connection. A number of other grasslike weeds, such as 

 "crab grass" and ''tickle grass," are also frequently heard of as 

 troublesome to young alfalfa. There is only one way to escape 

 from trouble of this kind, and that is by destroying the weeds 

 before sowing the alfalfa. This may be done at any time during 

 the spring or summer by harrowing the ground every week or 

 ten days for a period of a month of six weeks after it has been 

 plowed and otherwise fully prepared for the alfalfa. A longer 

 period of time is necessary for this weed killing process in the 



