Emmons County record., 1909-07-01
AS TO ALFALFA RAISING.
To inoculate or Not to Inoc ulate
That Is the Question.

w e. Cruiser. of Montrose, Pa.
who owns land i'm North Dakota and
IN other western states. and who is
therefore Interested practically i'm
everything that tends to the ad-
vancement of the west writes as fol
lows regarding alfalfa, he being
Record subscriber, and having read
the recent article IN this paper CON
cerning the raising of alfalfa i'm kid
der county II will be seen that he
does not believe incubation is "a ne
cessity The editor of the Record i'm
tends at an early date to ascertain.
through correspondence with per
sons i'm alfalfa growing sections.
which opinion is most prevalent
to inoculate on not to inoculatc. Fol-
lowing is MIR. Cruisers letter, dated
June 2.3d
Undoubtedly alfalfa can be sue
cessfully grown in North Dakota,
and i'm Emmons county. 1t is some
times stated that i'm order to grow
this money-naking plant it is neces-
sary to inoculate the fields with "A
little soil taken from a field which
has previously grown alfalfa Some
people are led To believe that this is
absolutely essential, but, ON the
other hand, there are people who do
not think it is necessary at all The
Kansas Experiment Station people
| say incubation is not necessary. IL
| has been grown with great success
| i'm Nebraska, both on the river bot
| toms, where at first il was thought
it was the only place it Woud grow,
and later on the uplands almost
equally as we'll. Whether or not the
soil needs To he inocuIated is
disputed question, some writers TAX
ing one side and some the other.
| But there is certainly a knowing
| how to raise it, which is probably
more important than is the question
Of incubation I'm other words,
| think "A piece Of alfalfa properly put
in, i'm ground rightly prepared. and
| not inoculated, will grow very much
i
| better than i'm an inoculated piece
| that has not been property pre-
pared. One essential is to have the
weeds killed out ahead of the crop
| The simplest way to do this is oplow
| the land in as thorough manner
as possible then let il lie few
| days, then harrow ii to clean out the
weeds, then wait until the weeds
come up again, and repeat the oper
alton la this way. with plenty of
narrowing. the land is made practic
ally free Of weeds Then sow the
alfalfa. not oothickly. along in July
on the first of August Some sow it
with nurse crop such as rye, bat
! think the majority of people be
| leve it better to .'oW without a
nurse crop. If it gets growth of
several inches the first year il will
do to clip it off with the moving
1 machine; If not, let il alone until
| the next year Some people think
| Fit should not be clipped until it
| shows blue flowers, then clip ii oil.
| And right here is where some people
think they have failed with alfalfa,
4 when they have not failed. In other
words, they expected IL To appear
green and rank, when in fact 1t does
not usually look that way but IT
will often seem spindling and appear
/ a little yelIowish, and after a year or
/ two it will grow strong and rank
4 / think this has sometimes been the
case where fields ,f alfalfa have
been plowed up when they should
not have been, simply because the
owner did not understand what The
crop should look like the first Year
or two.
DO not plo~ weed under Just be-
fore sowing il. as this creates an
4 air space. and, as alfalfa roots 20
| deep down to find water. they can
not 60 through AN air-space, and
4 the alfalfa dies. 7