24 
ANTS. 
Mr. R. E. Beatty, of Deer Trail, Colorado, writes as follows to 
the Field and Farm of Denver : 
“To kill red ants, pour two tablespoonfuls of Bisulfide of 
Carbon in their main entrance. Some light the gas and explode it, 
and say it works better, but I find the quickest way is to take an 
iron bar and make a hole down through the middle two fset deep, 
then pour in some of the liquid and close the hole, and it will make 
a clean sweep.” 
H. & Co., Clifton, Arizona, say : “Your Bisulfide of Carbon, 
is a sure deadner on red ants.” 
ALFALFA, GOPHERS AND MOLES. 
How to Cultivate the One, and also How to Exterminate the 
Others. 
A subscriber from Parsons, Kansas, wishes information on the 
following points : Is alfalfa a clover? Is it anymore beneficial to 
the soil than red clover? Is it any more nutritious in a gfeeu state 
than the clovers ? Is it more nutritious than hay? Will the red 
clover succeed under the same treatment as alfalfa where irrigation 
is necessary ? 
Another correspondent from Wamego, Kansas, wishes to know 
what is the best mode of fighting gophers and moles, which he states 
are the pests of the alfalfa field, especially on the alluvial soils of the 
river bottoms. He states that for more than ten years he has been 
growing alfalfa in his section, has cut as pinch as five tons per acre, 
and, in some seasons, twenty-one tons on three acres, but that the 
stand has always been ruined after three or four years and the land 
had to be changed, and he therefore wishes to know the best method 
of destroying the gophers or moles in the alfalfa field. He states 
that his boys have trapped them by the hundred, but that they mul- 
tiply in spite of all effortsat extermination. 
It is evident from communications like the above, says the Iowa 
Hotneslead, that there is a widespread interest on the subject of al- 
falfa growing, and therefore, we answer these questions somewhat 
in detail. Alfalfa is not, strictly speaking, a clover. It is a legume , 
and hence both belong to tin* same family and are closely related. 
They are, however, adapted to different conditions, and we know of 
no place where both are first-class crops under the same conditions. 
It may be stated as a maxim that clover ends where alfalfa begins, 
and where they are both grown side by side on precisely the same 
soil, neither of them do their best. Clover is partial to a clay soil. 
