DISADVANTAGES OF SPRING SOWING
Ordinarily, if a farmer sows in the spring, he has his old enemy, the weeds, to contend with. If the season be damp and cloudy, the alfalfa may not grow fast, but weeds will. Therefore, June may see him mowing to retard a rampant growth of weeds instead of gathering a profitable cutting of prime hay. It is not improbable that he may be doing the same in July or in September, thus losing a whole season. Again, the spring preparation comes when the farmer needs to be working his corn and potato land; hence he is likely to slight or neglect the careful preparation of the alfalfa ground and so do a poor job, with, in such cases, the usual result of a “poor stand.” Then too, the frequent rains interfere with regular disking and harrowing and the weeds may obtain a start the farmer cannot check. In most cases fall sowing means three cuttings the following year. In many instances spring sowing means no crop the first season, although better farming will gain a September crop, while the best farming, with no weeds, may give two if not three crops; not heavy ones, perhaps, but of no inconsiderable value.
Commenting on spring sowing in the more northern states, Henry Wallace, editor of Wallaces’ Farmer, says:
“Our own experience in growing alfalfa both in Nebraska and Iowa has taught us that it is a waste of time and labor to sow in the spring. If sown in the spring without a nurse crop, it will have to be mowed twice, probably three times, to keep down the weeds, and even then it will not be in as good condition as if a crop of early corn or even oats was taken off, and the ground put in fine condition and seeded in August.
“In 1904 we sowed in the spring 250 acres of alfalfa on our Nebraska farm, and some twenty or thirty acres of it was washed in ridges by a very heavy rain immediately after. We reseeded the vacant spaces in the fall and later could see no difference between the fall sowing and the spring sowing. We did the same thing on one of our Iowa farms, sowing in the spring and mowing three times. Another piece was sowed in August. The August sowing was much better than the spring sowing. It should be said, however, that the land was richer and the difference was therefore not all due to the time of sowing. So long as Kansas farmers continued to sow their alfalfa in the spring they had but partial success, owing to the fact that Crab grass and other grasses will come up in the early fall and smother out the spring sowing. By using some other crop the first part of the season, then putting the land in fine condition in the month of August or even by September 1st, an alfalfa crop can be started which will have a strong enough growth to smother out the weeds the next spring.
“We don’t know that we would insist on this so strongly for northern Iowa and Minnesota, but certainly from the latitude of the Northwestern railroad in Iowa, south, and corresponding latitude in other states, we would abandon spring sowing and sow alfalfa on well prepared ground in August. We would not, however, plow the ground for this fall sowing, but put the soil in first-class condition for a spring crop, then use a disk and harrow for the fall preparation.”