g them back frequently during the summer. The animals thus
grazed will also crop down weeds. This, at least, is true of sheep. The
author has succeeded in getting a good stand of alfalfa by sowing seed
at the rate of 15 pounds per acre, along with 2 to 4 pounds of Dwarf
Essex rape seed, and grazing the same with sheep. Other growers, during
recent years, have succeeded similarly. The grazing should not begin
until the plants have made a good start, but it should not be deferred
so long that the rape and the weeds will unduly shade the alfalfa
plants. The pasturing should not be too close, nor should it be so long
continued that the alfalfa plants will not be able to provide a good
growth in the early autumn before the advent of winter.

The management of the spring-sown crop the first season requires careful
attention in areas where the hazard exists in any considerable degree
that the plants may take serious harm at that season, or, indeed, fail
altogether. In Western areas, from Canada to Kentucky and Missouri, it
is important that the stubbles of the grain shall be cut high, amid
which alfalfa grows when it is sown with a nurse crop. When not thus
sown, it is of prime importance that the plants shall stand up several
inches above the surface of the ground before the advent of winter. This
is specially important in States west of the Mississippi River. The
objects effected are three-fold. First, the snow is arrested and held
for the protection of the plants, and to furnish them with moisture when
the snow melts. The extent to which the stubbles and the erect young
alfalfa plants will hold snow is simply surprising. On the exposed
prairies, the snow usually drifts so completely from unprotected lands,
that during almost any winter a large proportion of the area will be
quite bare. The melting of the snow thus held is also of much value to
the crop in the moisture which it brings to it, especially in areas
where the rainfall is less than normal. Second, the plants are thus
protected from the sweep of the cold winds which blow so much of the
season in the unprotected prairie, and which are frequently fatal to
various winter crops. Third, they are also protected from the intensity
of the frost, which may in some instances kill young alfalfa plants in
areas northward.

In the Northern States east of Minnesota, the New England States, and
the provinces of Canada east of Lake Huron, the considerable covering on
the ground i