Johnson Grass.
I am informed that Johnson grass 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 grass is poor, coarse stuff. The plant is most valuable for grazing when young. Johnson grass 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 coarse 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 coarse 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.