Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1901-01-05

lorna on Qrmer OASIS.
Turkestan Alfalfa.
The Introduction of Turkestan al
folfa into this country seems likely to
prove of great benefit to American
farmers. Prof. N. e. Hansen was sent
to Turkestan by the department of
agriculture to secure plants likely to
be of use in the United States, and the
seed of this clover was obtained with
the seed of some other plants. Tur-
kestan is a vast country, consisting
mostly of steppes and marshlands. As
a large part of the country is not
adapted to field tillage the people fol-
low cattle raising to very great ex-
tent. The climate of the country is
very similar to that of the semi-arid
west. The summers are very hot. dry,
long and cloudless. The autumns and
springs are mild and rainy. and the
winters usually open with but little
snow. Severe frosts sometimes occur,
but they are of short duration. The
evaporation is said to be greater than
the rainfall.
From May to September very little
rain falls, often only IL inches, and in
many parts of the steppe regions,
which are removed from the noun
famous districts, there is absolutely
no rain during the entire summer sea-
son. Dry winds from the north and
northeast prevail during the summer,
with a temperature of about 130 de-
grees f. Gao degrees Celsius), which
generally dry up the whole Turkestan
basin until vegetation cannot exist
without irrigation. The extent OF wa
tered lands in Turkestan is, in COM
parison with its whole area, by no
means great, not more than 214 per
cent, which is altogether insufficient
for the subsistence of its population.
This deficiency is partially redeemed
by the growing Of wheat, barley ana
millet, which depend on the winter
moisture in the soil and sufficient
fall of rain during the spring.
The following extracts from an ar
ticle by Prince v. 1. Massalski, of the
Russian department of agriculture,
show it's great value to the arid re-
gions of Russia than the European va
rieties:
Lucern clover (Medicago sativa var.
Turkestanica) is the chief forage in
use throughout Central Asia, and to
the settled population of Turkestan is
of the highest Importance, since dur
ing the summer it forms the chief
and in winter, prepared in the shape
of hay, the only fodder for cattle. 1t
is of all the greater Importance be-
cause, within the regions populated
by settled inhabitants, there are no
meadows Soft herbs and other grasses
that grow up in the early spring In
certain parts Of the steppes are quick
ly dried up by the hot rays of the sun
and give place to coarse, prickly stub
BILE or. in any case, to less nutrtttve
grasses that are in general united
for sheep, camels, or steppe cattle, and
still less fitted for horses or the cattle
of those who are settled in the oases
and are thus closely confined to the
foreland or rivers, in most cases far
removed from the steppes.
Massalski describes the native meth
DDS of cultivation and irrigation, and
continues: The native lucern would
seem to be a cattle fodder that cannot
be replaced in countries as dry and
hc-S as Turkestan and the Transcas-
plan province. Parallel experiments
that have been made in the Merv
oases, in the Transcaspian province,
in growing native and French lucern,
under widely different conditions of
water supply, have shown that the ma
tive lucern, particularly where there is
a lack Of water, is vastly superior to
the French in the crop 1t yields, and
that it is able to grow satisfactorily
with a minimum supply of water, a
supply SO small that the European
lucern would perish with drought. 1t
possesses a very large root system, and
its leaves are covered with thick down.
This. in conjunction with a deeply
channeled leaf. enables the plant, on
the one hand, to fmbibe the moisture
from the deeper layers of the soil. and,
on the other hand, to exhale it in very
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