The Mena weekly star., 1913-10-02
KANSAS IS STRONG
 FOR SWEET CLOVER.
Farmers Now Turning to What Was Thought to Be NOXiouS Weed as Fine DPouth-ReSisting
 Forage Crop.


 the Kansas City Star of recent date:
 While Kansas farmers are taking much interest in feterita for a drought resisting crop it might be well for them to take more than passing interest in what has here tofore been considered a roadside weed.
 It is sweet clover, that is now as suming wonderful possibilities as a forage plant in Western Kansas Sweet clover has always been con- sidered a weed and strenuous efforts have been made to stamp it out along the highways because the far mers considered it worthless as a feed. In fact, it was considered a noxious weed. almost as bad as the Russian thistle. Several efforts were made to get the legislature to pass law requiring the farmers to keep sweet clover from going to seed and compelling them to cut it along the highways.
 New England Found Its Value.
 It was not until New England far mers found that sweet clover would grow on their abandoned farms, make fine forage crops in addition to rehabilitating the kind that Kan sas farmers discovered that it had something Iii it's worst weed that was really worth while. The sweet clover was long regarded as worse than the Kansas sunfloWer.
 Last week George Finnup and C. I. Zirkle of Garden City sold sin gle carload of sweet clover seed for which they received 5000 in cash. It was sold to a Boston seed firm. Finnup now has fifteen hundred acres of sweet clover The Elmhurt Investment Company has five hun dred acres of sweet clover near Charleston, in Gray county and the company has been offered Sl2.50 a bushel for the seed by New Eng land seed firm.
 \ Rival tO Alfalfa.
 J. C. Mohler, assistant secretary of the Kansas Board of Agriculture, has been making a special investi- cation of sweet clover and it's for age possibilities on poor, Wornout and thin upland where there is in sufficient rainfall.
 Sweet clover is going to be a rival of alfalfa as forage crop, said Mr. Mohler. If grows well, makes big yields of hay and seed on land where alfalfa will not even sprout except in the most favorable seasons. It is a soil renoyator that has no equal in Kansas and Is a wonder on thin upland soils. The plants die every two years and the roots. extending a foot to 20 inches deep. rot and add humus to the soil. besides opening the ground and letting in air and water. It will thrive wherever weeds will grow. Its roots penetrate the hardest ground and the plants grow luXuri- ously on the poorest land in Kan sas and in the poorest seasons
 k. C. X. c. Indorses It.
 There is no question of the feed ing value of sweet clover. Prof. H. F. Roberts of the Kansas Agricul- tural College, in report on the plant, said:
 You may rest confident that the two plants, sweet clover and alfal- ia. are almost identical in chemicaI composition when taken at the same stage under the same cOndl- tions. Further, there is no doubt that if sweet clover is taken young enough so it is not too stemmy, il contains practically the same feed ing value as alfalfa"
 q. r. Miller, Jr of Topeka, ha; been experimenting with sweet clo- ver on an upland farm north of To- peka for several years. In state ment made to Mr. Mohler and pub lished in the Country Gentleman Mr. Miller tells of his eXperimen as follows:
 The second year of my expert ment I wanted to know the value O sweet clover as a milk producer. took ten average milch cows iron good prairie and bluegrass pastur about May 10 and put them int this sweet clover patch. It had at tained a very rank growth and Wa more than two feet high.
 Cows Gained in Milk.
 The COWS were kept there tw, weeks, and at the end of that tim had gained an average of five gal Ions of milk a head. About June I returned the COWS to the prairi pasture and in two weeks they hat lost the five gallons that had beer gained.
 Brought back to sweet clover, il two weeks they gained three gal Ions. The weather was very hO and the clover was really too ranl for the best results. But thes cows maintained an excellent floy of milk throughout the season ol this little half-acre tract of swee clover. For pasture, it is far bet ter than alfalfa in at least one re spect: It contains a poisonous in