Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station 
BULLETIN 90. JUNE, 1904. 
Unirrigated Alfalfa on Upland. 
BY J. E. PAYNE. 
Since the wave of settlement flowed into eastern Colorado in 
1886, men in isolated localities have been testing alfalfa as a for¬ 
age plant for the nnirrigated lands. 
During my travls I have had several small plats of alfalfa 
under observation, usually seeing the crop one or more times dur¬ 
ing each year. Near Vernon, Robert Brady had a field which he 
used for a hog pasture for several years. The plants kept dying 
out until there were practically none left. Another patch near 
Vernon survived as much as five years or more. It was cut for 
hay a few times. One year it was nearly three feet high when 
cut. When seen in 1903 it still showed a thin stand. Another 
patch on the same farm was sown in the spring of 1900. I11 1901 
it gave a heavy crop of hay, but has not grown tall enough to cut 
since. Jas. Slick had a small field of alfalfa which he used as a 
hog pasture for several years. The grasshoppers destroyed what 
was left of it in 1902. In 1902 he sowed five acres, but the grass¬ 
hoppers have kept this down so that so far it has yielded very 
little forage. Russian thistles also came in and occupied the field 
as soon as the alfalfa plants were killed out. 
Near Logan, Geo. Bond had about four acres in alfalfa which 
he used for hog pasture for several years. He thought that it 
payed well. A. C. Brown, who lives on the Kansas line about 
seven miles northeast of Lansing, had three acres in alfalfa when 
I saw the place in 1900. This patch had been seeded about seven 
years then. Mr. Brown told me that he cut it twice some years, 
once some years and during some other years it did not grow high 
enough to cut for hav. The average yearly yield of hay Mr. 
Brown estimated at one ton per acre. 
Near Idalia, John Gillespie sowed eight acres to alfalfa in 
1902. Both 1902 and 1903 were so droughty in his neighbor¬ 
hood that he has not yet cut a hay crop from it. The same ex¬ 
perience was met by John Reidesel and Chas. Ingalls, and also by 
some others who sowed about the same time. Near Vona, S. L. 
