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Show GROW ALFALFA ON DRY LAND Numerous Cases Where Abundant Crop Secured on Sandy and Clay Lands Selecting Seed. J. E. Payne, who is a graduate of the Kansas agricultural college, and who for the past fourteen years has been in charge of the dry farming experiment ex-periment station of eastern Colorado, Colo-rado, advises that he has found numerous nu-merous cases in which alfalfa is doing well on the uplands of eastern Color-Mo and western Kansas. One case is quoted where one man in that section sec-tion has 100 acres of alfalfa which was sown on sandy land two years ago, and Is now doing well, although the first seeding was laid on freshly broken sod which had been fined down with a disk harrow. Other fields in the same county are reported which are growing on clay land and this shows that alfalfa will thrive on either type of soil, provided a proper selection of seed has been made and the ground well prepared. In regard to the preparation of the seed bed, Professor Payne says: "The men who have succeeded best with unirrigated alfalfa have prepared pre-pared their land well and then seeded it when an abundant supply of moisture mois-ture was present. Some have sown with success as late as August 1, upon land which had been plowed early and kept free from weeds until the time of seeding. With perfect germination and perfect soil conditions condi-tions one pound of alfalfa seed will produce enough plants to cover an acre of land, but many have recommended recom-mended fifteen to twenty pounds an acre. The amounts sown which have given the best results on dry land have been from three to ten pounds per acre. And it is possible that from five to ten pounds of good seed will give better results than larger quantities, because all extra alfalfa plants not needed are weeds which weaken the plants that survive the competition. |