The Prescott daily news., 1914-09-19
TURK ESTAN ALFALFA SEED
 IS FOUND INFERIOR
The Commercial Variety Both Higher in Price and Poorer in Qual- ity Than the Home Grown
 Product.

PrOduct.
 Washington, D. C., Sept. 19.--A warning to alfalfa growers to avoid the use of commercial Turkestan seed is contained in Department Bulletin No. 13S, of the U. e. Department of Agriculture, which is shortly to he issued under the title "Commcrcial Turkestan Alfalfa Seed"
 Specialists of the Department have been Investigating the comparative merits of different kinds of alfalfa seeds and have reached the conclu- sion that there is nothing to recom- mend the Turkestan variety for gener- al use in this country. It is, they say, particularly unsuited to the humid climate of the East which, as mat ter of fact, uses most of the Turkestan seed imported into this country. This seed is also not sufficiently hardy to warrant it's general use in the upper Mississippi Valley where hardness is an important factor. The investiga- tors, however, are careful to distin- guish between commercial Turkestan alfalfa and special strains of hardy alfalfas that have been developed from certain introductions of seed from Turkestan. Valuable varieties of al- falfas unquestionably exist in cen tral Asia, but these are at present only fitted for use in experimental work in breeding
 At the present time, approximate ly one-ffth of the alfalfa seed used in the United States is imported, Of this quantity practically all-95 per cent in the last twelve months-comes from Russian Turkestan. In the Flu ropean market, commercial Turkestan is the cheapest seed available; in this country it's wholesale price is less than that of domestic seed. In spite of this fact, however, mistaken be- lief in its superior qualities has re- suited in raising it's retail price to point frequently above the domestic seed. No such preference is shown in the alfalfa growing regions of Flu rope. There French seed is common ly considered the best, with Italian ranking next, and Turkestan last. Under these circumstances, very lit tie French and Italian seed finds it's way to the United States, the bulk of the importations being, as already stated, the cheap commercial Turkes- tan.
 Fortunately. growers who wish to avoid this variety can readily iden- tify it by the presence of Russian knapweed seeds. These seeds have not been found anywhere except in commercial Turkestan seed and here they are practically always present. Russian knapweed is in some ways similar to quack grass, Johnson grass and Canada thistle, spreading both by seeds and underground rootstocks. The seeds are slightly larger than those of alfalfa and cannot all be re- moved by any practicable method of machine cleaning. Their challly white color makes them especially conspi- cious, and their symmetrical form slightly wedge ped-distinguishes them from the notched seed of other species often found in varieties of al- falfa from other sections The knap- weed seeds, however, are not usually found in large quantities and any lot of alfalfa should, therefore, be ex- amined in bulk. The examination of small samples is not sufficient to show whether the alfalfa comes from Fur kestan or not.