The nonpartisan leader. [volume], June 30, 1919, Image 10

About The nonpartisan leader. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1915-1921

Image provided by: State Historical Society of North Dakota

                
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The following article is taken from Farmers' Bulletin
1005 by the United States department of agriculture.
Those who desire to go into the subject further may find
valuable information in Bulletin 797 on the details of
growing sweet clover, Bulletin 8S6 on harvesting and
threshing it, and Bulletin 820 on methods of utilizing it.
.The department of agriculture, Washington, D. C., is glad
to furnish these bulletins on request.
HE value of sweet clover h$s
been demonstrated on numer
ous farms in the corn belt.
The sowing of scarified
seed often means the differ-
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Hitherto, however, it has been
grown in this region mainly on
odd fields, outside of any set
rotation or cropping system. As
yet, comparatively little atten
tion has been given to fitting
sweet clover into the farm system as one of the
regular crops.
The fact that sweet clover is found growing
as a weed along a roadside is no indication that
it will thrive in adjacent fields. Frequent
trials have shown the folly of depending upon
such indications. Success with sweet clover is
rare unless three essentials of such Buccess
have been provided, namely, lime, inoculation
and scarified seed—that is, seed that has been
so treated as to scratch or crack the hard coat ..
and make it easy for moisture to penetrate
and hasten germination.
The first and most urgent requirement of sweet
clover is lime. Probably more failures with sweet
clover throughout the corn belt can be traced di
rectly to lack of lime than to any other one cause.
The absolute necessity of lime in growing sweet
clover presents a serious difficulty where farms
are located at a considerable distance from any
shipping point or limestone quarry. ...?
USE OF LIME WHEN
ROTATING CLOVER CROP
If sweet clover is to be rotated over the entire
farm, lime should be applied to each field before
the crop is sown thereon for
the first time. An exception
to this rule may be made in
limestone sections where al
falfa is known to do well nat
urally, or where actual experi
ments have shown that sweet
clover can be grown success
fully without the application
of lime. Even in limestone
sections it often happens that
the surface soil is deficient in
lime. Inoculation is very impor
tant and should not be neg
lected. In some sections cer
tain soils have the required
bacteria already present, but
unless this fact has been fully
determined, failure to inoculate
either the seed or the soil of
the field adds a big element of
uncertainty.
1916 ALSWE CLOVCR
1917
19)6
I9I6-C0RN
1917" BARLEY I0A.WHEOT
ISA. OATS I5A.~
(SWEET CLOVER EOA.
(ALSIKE CLOVER 20A.
1916- SWEET CLOVER 20A.
ALSIKE. CLOVER ZOA.
0
J* S
*fi 9 S'
CORN
19H ALFALFA IN.BARLEY
I9IB- ALFALFA
19re SWEET CLOVER SEED
1917- CORN
1916 BARLEY -VOLUNTEER
SWEET CLOVER
1916 OATS-SEEDED TO
SWEET CLOVER ISA.
ALSWE CLfcVERMA,
1917 SWEET CLOVER *5A.]
,.*4: ALSIKE CLOVER 35A
1918 CORN -SWEET
CLOVER TO BE
SOWN IN CORN
Iliis farmer makes a practice of using the oat crop as hog pasture as
soon as itisuptwo or three inches. As the oat crop is eaten off, the
fjover comes in and carries the hogs through the remainder of the season.
ve Sfytf
General plan of an Iowa grain
and livestock farm, with sweet
clover in the cropping system.
mm
Sweet Clover Experience in Corn Belt
Found Valuable in Rotation and as Catch Crop—Nearly Doubles Capacity of
Blue Grass Pasture—Lime and Inoculation of Seed Important
ence between a good
stand and one that is
very poor or even al
together lacking. It is
true that much of the
seed raised in some sec
tions of the corn belt
is sown locally without
having the tough seed
coat roughened by the
process known as scari
fying. Good stands are
often secured in this
way, but generally more
seed is required than
when scarified seed is
used, and the practice
entails an unnecessary
risk. It is especially
important to have sweet
clover seed scarified if
it has been grown in
a dry climate.
The general characteristics of sweet clover make
it an easy matter to place it definitely in any of
the rotations or cropping systems common to the
corn belt. The introduction of this crop makes pos
sible also new arrangements of crops and systems
of farming not now in common .use. Sweet clover
is a biennial,,and fits well in either short or long
rotations much the same as common, red, mam
moth and alsike clover, timothy or mixed hay.
Unlike alfalfa, it may be rotated over the
entire farm in a comparatively short time. In
addition to filling a valuable place in various
corn-belt rotations as a hay, pasture, silage
or seed crop, it serves as an emergency pas
ture or as an extremely valuable crop to be
plowed under for soil improvement.
Sweet clover may be sown between two of the
main farm crops of the rotation to serve the pur
pose of a green manure crop
without occupying the land
during a full crop season.
-4.
Grown thus, it makes a better
crop for plowing under and gives
more growth than any other
legume common to the region.
If conditions are right the sweet
clover will grow with great
vigor after the small grain crop
in which it is sown is taken off.
By late fall it has usually made
a growth equivalent to approx
imately a ton of hay per acre.
Sweet clover may be plowed un-
der either in the fall or spring.
Some growers prefer not to plow
under the fall crop of the first
year, for fear that it will come
up again the next spring and be
troublesome in the crop of corn or
oats which is to follow.
The danger of sweet clover coming
up and being troublesome when plow
ed under in the fall depends very
largely upon the manner in which the
plowing is done. If the plowing is
thoroughly done there is little danger'
in this connection.
In using sweet clover as a catch
crop the most general practice is to
wait until comparatively late hi the
spring of .the second year and then
plow it under in preparation for corn.
The plowing is generally postponed
until about the middle of May in order
to have a good growth to plow under,
that time the sweet clover usually Will
made a growth, approximately equal to a
er acre. Though May 15 is a little
for corn, farmers are following this
practice, depending upon the beneficial
effect of the sweet clover plowed under
to push the growth of the corn
and make up for the delay in
planting.
Whenever it" lis possible to
manage the plowing success
fully, this practice becomes a
very effective means of soil
improvement. In fact, even
jjhtragb used only
as a
2
catch
mnnimhi
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1
Sweet clover requires two
years for maturity, at which
time it will produce a large
hay yield. In the first year it
will give as much as a ton to
the acre. Pasture and si
lage are other val
uable uses. ,,
crop for plowing under, sweet clover may be well
considered a valuable crop for the corn belt.
Sweet clover growers generally prefer the fall
crop of the first year for hay, since the growth then
is finer and the hay is of better quality than at
any other time. The hay cut from this crop is
practically equivalent to first class alfalfa hay.
Usually there is taken up with it some stubble
from the small grain crop in which the sweet
clover was sown, but this feature is not objection
able when the hay is for farm use.
SPRING CROP SECOND
YEAR USUALLY COARSE
In the spring of the second year the growth of
sweet clover is more rank and somewhat coarser
than that of the preceding fall. Some growers dtf
not use the spring growth for hay, but others cut
it regularly and are well satisfied with the results.
The spring crop should seldom be cut later than
May 26 in the latitude of central Illinois, because
of danger of killing the plants, but by that time
from a ton to a ton and a half of hay can usually
be taken off, and in exceptional cases even more.
Contrary to the general belief that sweet
clover is not palatable to stock, this crop is
used on some of the more successful tarms of
the corn belt as the principal pasture crop.
There is no trouble in getting livestock to eat
sweet clover pasture readily unless the growth
is too big and tough before the animals are
turned in on it for the first time. Even then
there is little trouble unless there is an abun
dance of other pasturage which is more succu
lent. The numerous instances of an extensive
use of sweet clover as the main pasture crop
of the farm are sufficient evidence that, if
rightly managed, this crop may be depended
upon for pasture purposes throughout the
corn belt.
Sweet clover may be used for silage, but as yet
this practice has not become common in the corn
belt section. Those who have used it thus, how
ever, are very enthusiastic over the results ob
tained. Some growers have put the fall crop of
the first year in the silo. This crop makes excellent
silage, although ordinarily it is preferable as hay.
A good example of a two-year rotation, subject
to slight variations as emergency dictates, was
found in Ogle county, HI. After some eight years
of experience in farming with sweet clover W. P.
Graham has worked out a very satisfactory system
of this kind for thjree farms, which are rented out
on a share basis, the rent being taken in grain de
livered at the elevator. This rotation is as follows:
First year—Corn. Second year—Small grain
oats or wheat—with a seeding of sweet clover.
Some very successful and effective wo^k in the
growth of sweet clover as. a farm crop on a grain
and livestock farm has be,en done by Frank Cover-"
dale of Clinton county, Iowa. The early experimen
tal work dates back approximately 21 years, and
for about 20 years sweet clover has been grown ex
tensively as one of his main crops. After the prelim
inary work a general system was formulated
which conforms roughly to a three-year rotation as
follows
First year—Corn., Second year—Oats, Barley or
spring wheat, with a seeding of sweet clover and
timothy. Third year—Sweet clover and timothy.
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