288 THE BOOK OF ALFALFA 



river bottom lands of the state as are above overflow and 

 are underlaid with gravel, giving* natural drainage. The 

 experience of Ohio growers of alfalfa has demonstrated 

 the following points : ( i ) Alfalfa must have lime. If 

 the soil is naturally deficient in this substance it must be 

 added artificially. (2) Alfalfa must have humus. It 

 is idle to attempt to grow it upon a soil which has been 

 worn so thin that it will not grow a good crop of corn. 

 Such soils must be manured before they will successfully 

 produce alfalfa. In this respect it is very different from 

 the plant which it so closely resembles in habit of growth, 

 S^^^eet clover. (3) Alfalfa will not grow with wet feet, 

 yet it is a great consumer of water, and the soil must be of 

 such a character as to hold large stores of water without 

 being water logged. Hence the value of bottom lands 

 naturally underdrained by strata of gravel a few feet be- 

 low the surface. (4) When lime, humus and drainage 

 are supplied, the bacterial organisms through which at- 

 mospheric nitrogen is assimilated will gradually appear 

 upon the alfalfa roots, but their growth may be hastened 

 by inoculating the land with soil from a field in which 

 alfalfa or Sweet clover has previously grown. The ex- 

 periment station has been most successful in getting a 

 stand of alfalfa where the land was thoroughly prepared 

 in the spring and then harrowed every week or ten days 

 until July or August The seed was then sown and 

 harrowed in. By this means the weed seeds were germ- 

 inated and destroyed before the alfalfa was sown. 



OREGON 



George W. Dunn, Jackson county. — ^For eight years I 

 have grown 60 acres of alfalfa on bottom land with 



