HINTS ON RAISING FARM CROPS 41 
can be done is to buy a small bottle of alfalfa 
bacteria culture from a seed house, or from an 
agricultural college, and sprinkle the liquid 
f culture over the seed, just before planting, 
j This will supply enough bacteria to start the 
I young alfalfa plants in good shape. Another, 
; more laborious method, is to haul some soil 
l from a field that has already grown alfalfa, 
to the new piece, that is to be put into alfalfa. 
■ A few loads per acre is all that is generally 
needed. This involves much of the farmer’s 
time and energy, and when it is considered 
that a bottle of the bacterial culture can gen¬ 
erally be purchased from the state agricultural 
colleges for about twenty-five cents, it is hard¬ 
ly worth while to haul the soil on to the new 
field. If these few requirements that have been 
mentioned are provided, a good stand of al¬ 
falfa should result. To repeat, these require¬ 
ments are: hardy seed, well drained land, land 
free from acidity and proper inoculation. This 
may seem like rather exacting demands by the 
alfalfa plant, but when the value of alfalfa is 
compared to other hay or pasture plants, the 
effort is very much worth while. 
What has been said in the proper prepara¬ 
tion of the seed bed for other grass seed espe¬ 
cially applies to alfalfa. We will not repeat 
these directions, but suffice it to say that a 
good seed bed is imperative. Alfalfa can be 
seeded in at least two different ways. It can 
either be sown on land the middle of the sum¬ 
mer that has been worked periodically during 
the summer to preserve moisture and kill 
weeds, or it can be sown with a nurse crop. 
