FORTY-SECOND ANNUAL CONVENTION 287 



animals has much the .^ame laxative effect on them as June pas- 

 ture. A dairyman at Elgin, 111., having 50 cows, says that every 

 month's feeding of alfalfa in winter gives him a month of prac- 

 tically pasture conditions. ''The cows show the pasture-effect 

 in the glossy condition of their "hair and in the yield of milk, and 

 have never before looked quite so well." 



Remarkable plant that it is, yielding under widely varying 

 conditions well-nigh incredible growths of incomparable forage, 

 some brains are requisite to success in its growth. To say that 

 "any fool can grow alfalfa" is quite misleading, but with fair 

 treatment under fairly favorable conditions it is bringing good 

 fortune to thousands of those growers who know it best and use 

 a fair intelligence in their dealings with it. Among its funda- 

 mental requirements is a fairly fertile soil, always — which it im- 

 proves rather than depletes — free from weed seeds, in good tilth, 

 with a surface painstakingly prepared. Alfalfa roots go down 

 where those of no other plants go, and reaching the moisture, the 

 mineral and other elements in the subsoils, bring them to the 

 surface. 



As a fertilizer alfalfa roots work most astonishing changes 

 in the soil. They push their downward way in every direction, 

 honeycombing the land with their growth ; in the eventual pro- 

 cess of decay some of them are all the time dying, and plowing 

 up an alfalfa field one finds the subsoil filled with their decaying 

 matter, leaving humus below where any other agencies have put 

 it. It is there for future use, and the soil is filled with perfora- 

 tions through which the rains percolate, carrying with them other 

 fertilization from the surface. 



Alfalfa is not primarily a pasture crop; cattle, sheep and 

 ruminants — animals that chew the cud — grazing on it will al- 

 most invariably bloat, and probably die, if they do not have 

 prompt attention. Horses, hogs and animals that do not chew 

 the cud, can graze on it without danger. Further, it is almost too 

 valuable for pasture; that is, it can be utilized to greater profit 

 in other ways. One of these is to mow and feed it uncured. If 

 so used, slightly wilted, nothing bloats from eating it. Cured 

 as hay, it does no harm to anything that eats it. One can have 



