One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered Part 36

If you wet down the land thoroughly and then plow and harrow and plant either cow peas or Indian corn, you ought to get a good green crop before frost. Drill in or drop the seed in rows about three feet apart and keep cultivating and irrigating as long as you can get through without injuring the crop too much. Use about 40 pounds of cow peas to the acre.

Hurry-up Pasture.

What can I plant this fall which would produce pasturage for a small amount of stock this winter, and until I can get the land under irrigation and seeded to alfalfa?

For quick fall and winter growth nothing is better probably than oats and vetches sown together as soon as you get rain enough to plow, but it would be a question whether it is worth while to work for that, because you ought to get your land ready for February sowing of alfalfa and that will keep the land busy after the rain gets it into working condition.

Johnson Gra.s.s.

I am informed that Johnson gra.s.s makes fine hay. I have not sown the seed yet, but would like to know if the hay is good and if it will grow on dry land. I have the seed on hand, but do not want to sow it if it is not good.

Johnson gra.s.s is poor, coa.r.s.e stuff. The plant is most valuable for grazing when young. Johnson gra.s.s will not grow on really dry land, but it will take the best moist land it can find and hold on to it. It is sensitive to frost and is not a winter grower except in the absence of frost.

Improving Heavy Land for Alfalfa.

My land is very heavy, red loam, and crusts over very hard in dry seasons. I would like to know if it would be best to use barnyard compost over the surface as a mulch, or would it be best to use plain straw for that purpose?

A very heavy soil can be brought into better surface condition for alfalfa by plowing in stable manure as soon as possible after the fall rains, in order that the manure may have opportunity to become disintegrated and mixed with the soil by the time for alfalfa sowing, which is from February to April - whenever the heavy frosts of the locality are over. For a small piece, you might get a better stand by using a light mulch of disintegrated coa.r.s.e manure or even straw, scattering it after the sowing, but for a large acreage this would involve too much labor. It is not desirable to work in much manure or other coa.r.s.e stuff at the time of sowing the seed, but you can make a light surface application after the plant has made a start.

Cultivating Alfalfa.

When is the best time to cultivate alfalfa, and how often during the season is it advantageous to do so? Which is the best implement to use?

Cultivated alfalfa is a term applied to alfalfa sown in rows and allowed to grow in narrow bands with cultivated land between, and the irrigation is then done in a furrow in the narrow cultivated strip. This will give thriftier growth and perhaps more hay to the acre than flooded, broad-casted alfalfa, but it will cost so much more that the acre profit would probably be less. This is an intensive culture of alfalfa, which is still to be tested out in California, if any one should be inclined to do it. Some one-cow suburbanite would be in condition to try the scheme first. Probably you refer to disking, and for that an ordinary disk is used with the disks set pretty straight to reduce the side cutting, and this is done at different times of the year by different growers. By doing it when the ground gets dry in the early spring much of the foul stuff is cut out before the alfalfa starts strongly. But disking seems to be good whenever in the year the soil is dry enough to take it well.

Suburban Alfalfa Patch.

How can we rid the alfalfa of weeds? As we are obliged to hire help, and do not succeed in getting the hay cared for until we have mostly stalks without leaves, I have put the cow on it to pasture it off.

The cow knows how to handle it, but you will not get as much alfalfa as if you cut and carried it to her. If you cut sooner you will get rid of many plants which are propagated by the seeds which they produce, and you will also get better hay, more leaves and fewer stalks. Cut it about the time it begins to bloom, not waiting for the full bloom to appear.

Alfalfa and Bermuda.

I have land which was seeded to alfalfa some 15 years ago and has been pastured continuously until it was almost all Bermuda. I had it thoroughly plowed, disk harrowed and sowed to oats; disk harrowed in, and drag harrowed. After cutting for hay this year I intend putting it in Egyptian corn in rows, so it can be cultivated to get rid of Bermuda.

I have also been advised to plow the land immediately after harvesting corn and let it lie until next January and then plow and sow to barley and alfalfa as I wish to grow alfalfa. Kindly let me know if method is right. The land is sandy loam and under irrigation.

Whether you will fully succeed against Bermuda gra.s.s or not is doubtful.

It is probable, however, that you can reduce the Bermuda so that other cultivated crops can be continuously grown. Common experience is that Bermuda will hold on unless you have hard freezing of the ground to a considerable depth, as they have in the northern States. The best use that you can make of land infested with Bermuda is to get as good a stand as you can of alfalfa and let the alfalfa fight for itself. The combination of alfalfa and Bermuda gra.s.s makes very good hay or pasturage. We should, however, sow the alfalfa alone and not handicap it by sowing with barley. The Bermuda will smile at that advice. Egyptian corn can be planted in rows, 2 1/2 to 3 feet between the rows to admit of easy cultivation

Bermuda Gra.s.s.

What is the value of Bermuda gra.s.s as a forage crop for cattle, more particularly dairy cows?

Bermuda gra.s.s is generally condemned because of getting in places where it is not desirable and of being almost impossible of eradication therefrom. Still, Bermuda gra.s.s will make good pasturage on land which is too alkaline to make other crops, and therefore is highly esteemed by some owners of waste lands in the San Joaquin valley. It is good pasturage and is most easily propagated by cutting the roots up into short pieces by use of the hay-cutter, nearly all the pieces retaining an eye which will make a new plant. It is easy to get in and hard to get out.

Salt Gra.s.s and Alfalfa.

I have some land in Sutter county and it has some of this salt gra.s.s in spots. I am about to take a twenty-acre piece and put in alfalfa, but some old-timers tell me that the salt gra.s.s on it is bad stuff to handle.

Your trouble will probably be not so much the salt gra.s.s, but the alkali in the soil which the salt gra.s.s can tolerate and which other plants cannot stand. You cannot then subst.i.tute alfalfa for salt gra.s.s without getting the alkali out of the soil, and you cannot do this without having sufficient drainage so that the rainfall may wash the alkali out from the soil and carry it away in the drainage water. You probably cannot get a satisfactory growth of alfalfa on the spots where the salt gra.s.s has established itself, although the land round about may be very satisfactory to alfalfa.

Giant Spurry.

I would like information about spurry. How much frost will it stand?

What is time for sowing? Its value as crop to plow under?

From a California point of view, spurry is a winter-growing weed which has been approved by orchardists in Sonoma county because it yields a considerable amount of vegetation for turning under with the spring plowing of the orchard. For this purpose it should be sown at the beginning of the rainy season. Its value as a crop to turn under depends upon the amount of growth you can get. It is not a legume and, therefore, does not have the value of the nitrogen-gathering plant.

Still, it yields humus and, therefore, is valuable for winter growing as ordinary weeds, gra.s.ses, grains, etc., are.

Light Soil and Scant Moisture.