One Thousand Questions in California Agriculture Answered Part 39

I am about to put a piece of land into alfalfa, and want to use the most economical system of preparing the land for irrigation. My neighbors tell me that it will be necessary for me to have the land leveled; at a cost of $6 to $10 per acre. Now I am informed that in Alberta, and some places in California, they do not go to the expense of leveling land, but use a system of preparing land for irrigation at a cost of about 60 cents per acre.

Nothing except a highly educated gale of wind, with discriminating cutting and filling ability of a very high order, could do it for that price. The cheapest way to prepare land for irrigation is the contour check method, which is largely used, or the flooding in strips between levees at right angles to the supply ditch; but neither of these could be put in properly for that money, even if the land was naturally in such shape that a minimum amount of soil-s.h.i.+fting is necessary.

Where Alfalfa is Grown.

In what counties is alfalfa most successfully grown? By this I mean where three crops of hay may be had each growing season. Also, will corn grow good paying crops in same sections?

Alfalfa is grown all through the valleys and foothills of interior California; also to a certain extent in coast valleys. On suitable lands, three crops can sometimes be secured without irrigation, while twice or three times as many cuttings are secured on irrigated lands where the frost-free season is particularly long. According to the last census, we are growing alfalfa on 19,104 farms with a total acreage of 484,098. The total value of the product is over $13,000,000. Corn is widely grown, but is small as compared with alfalfa. It is grown in alfalfa districts and in coast valleys where there is not much done with alfalfa.

Sowing Alfalfa.

What is the proper time to sow alfalfa? Some advocate fall and others spring sowing. What seasons are given for each sowing?

We shall undoubtedly soon get to sowing alfalfa all the year round except in the short season of sharp frosts and cold wet ground in November, December and January. If you can get a good start in September and October, all right; if not, wait until February and March, according to the season. Where it is never very cold or wet, sow whenever moisture is right. There never can be any rule about it, for localities will differ.

Foxtail and Alfalfa.

Will foxtail choke out and exterminate alfalfa? Some fields look as though the foxtail had crowded the alfalfa out, but I hold that the alfalfa died from some other cause and the foxtail merely took its place.

Foxtail will not choke out alfalfa, providing, soil and moisture conditions are right for the latter, and a good stand of plant has been secured. If anything is wrong with the alfalfa, the foxtail will be on the alert to take advantage of it. You will always have foxtail with you, and considerable quant.i.ties of it, perhaps, in the first cutting, because foxtail will grow at a lower temperature than alfalfa, and, therefore, will keep very busy during the rainy season, while the alfalfa is more or less dormant, but as the heat increases, if the soil is good and moisture ample, the alfalfa will put the foxtail out of sight until the following winter invites it to make another aggressive growth. Therefore, we answer that alfalfa does not die from foxtail, but from some condition unfavorable to the alfalfa, which must be sought in the soil, or in the moisture supply, or traced back to bad seed, and a poor stand at the beginning.

Which Alfalfa is Best?

I have in Stanislaus county ten acres of Arabian alfalfa, which was sown the first week in April this year. It was clipped in July and irrigated.

It is now about 14 inches high, but looks sickly, turns white at the tips, and some dies down. There are several places here with the Arabian alfalfa on them and with the same trouble, while the ordinary variety is looking fine by the side of it.

Arabian alfalfa usually makes a good show at first and begins to run out afterward. It does not seem to be so long-lived and satisfactory as the common variety. With this prospect ahead of you, according to present experience, it would seem to be desirable to plow the crop in and seed again with the common variety, or with the Turkestan, which is proving the most satisfactory of the recently introduced varieties.

Fall Sowing of Alfalfa.

We have summer-fallowed land which we know will grow good alfalfa, and as we have just had four inches of rainfall upon it, we were wondering if we could not plow the twenty acres and get a stand upon it in time to stand the cold weather this winter. Do you think this is practicable?

If four inches of rain on summer fallow connects well with the lower moisture which a good summer fallow ought to conserve in the soil, such sowing is rational; but if the summer fallowing was not done well, that is, if it was rough plowing without enough harrowing, as is too often the case, the four inches of rain might not be safe because of the dry ground beneath waiting to seize the moisture and so dry the surface that sprouting alfalfa plants would perish between dry soil below and dry wind above. Fall sowing will give enough growth to resist frost killing in many places in the valley if the moisture in the soil is enough to carry the plant as well as start it, or if showers come frequently - otherwise it is dangerous, not from frost but from drouth.

Alfalfa Hay and Soil Fertility.

We are feeding all our hay to dairy cows, returning the manure to the soil. At present prices of hay, my neighbors who sell theirs, seem to be as well off, with considerable less work; but how about the future? Can this soil be cropped indefinitely and the crops sold, without returning anything to the land?

It is a mistake to think that you can sell alfalfa hay indefinitely without reducing the soil. It may gain in nitrogen by the wastes of the plant, but it will lose in other const.i.tuents unless reinforced by fertilization. No single act can make for the maintenance of the soil as the growing and feeding of crops and return of manure does.

Dry-Land Alfalfa.

I am in a country of strictly dry farming. I have a wash or gulch on my place and would like to know if I could, with success, plant it to alfalfa without irrigation; soil is sandy loam, no evidences of springy moisture at all. What kind should I try?

Alfalfa will endure much drouth. What it will do in a particular place can only be told by trying. Sow Turkestan alfalfa. If the rains come early so as to wet the land down in September and October, sow the seed then. The endurance of the plant will depend much upon its having a chance to root deeply before the drouth comes on.

Inoculating Alfalfa.

Is it profitable to inoculate alfalfa seed before planting to increase its yield? Can it be done by leaching soil from old alfalfa ground, providing it has been plowed up and allowed to stand for a year? Are commercial inoculants a safe thing to inoculate with?

Apparently alfalfa does not need inoculation in this State. Probably not one acre in ten thousand now profitably growing alfalfa has ever had artificial introduction of germs. You can make germ-tea, if you wish, of the soil you describe; one year's exposure would not destroy the germs.

It is safe enough to use commercial cultures. You will have to decide for yourself whether it is worth while.

Irrigating Alfalfa.

I am making parallel ridges for alfalfa, sending a full head of water down to the end of the field between each ridge. Should I calculate the lands to be mowed one at a time in even swaths? The mower being 5-foot cut, would you count on cutting a 4 1/2 or 5-foot swath? This soil is sandy, water percolating rapidly. The fall is 8 feet to the mile. How wide, then, would you advise making the ridges to suit the mower, and to flood economically, using from 2 to 4 cubic feet per second? The length of the lands is across 40 acres.

Growing alfalfa in long parallel checks, to be flooded between the levees, is the way in which much alfalfa is being put in at the present time where the land has such a slope as you indicate. It is calculated, however, to seed the levees as well as the check bottoms, and to run the mowers across the levees, thus leaving no waste land and mowing across the whole field and not between the levees as you propose. For that purpose these levees are made low, not over a foot in height, calculating that they will settle to about six or eight inches, which is sufficient to hold the water and direct its flow gently down the slope.

There is, however, a limit to the distance over which water can be evenly distributed in this way, the difference being dependent upon the character of the soil, slope, etc. A length of nine hundred feet is sometimes found too great for an even distribution, and, for this reason, supply ditches at shorter intervals are introduced.

Unirrigated Alfalfa.