LUCERNE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXII, Issue 19443, 31 October 1925, Page 23 (Supplement)

LUCERNE

“THE MORTGAGE LIFTER.” A REMARKABLE TESTIMONY. In the western States of America lucerne, or as they call it, alfalfa, has dubbed “the .mortgage lifter,-’’ owing to its magnificent cropping qualities. Lucerne, it is agreed by all who know it and its marvellous potentialities, will be the salvation of Central Otago, and incidentally so increase the output of milk and mutton that Dunedin City as the export base will most materially benefit. There is in the air at present a proposal that an area of land should be acquired in Central Otago for the sole purpose of growing lucerne seed of a variety which its promoters claim can be grown without irrigation, without lime and without inoculation of soil, a variety which will defy frost, drought, carlessness, or close grazing, and apparently an ideal plant for our up-country use. The secretary of the Otago Expansion League (Mr. W. B. Steel) has been endeavouring to enlist the co-operation I of some Central growers in this variety, ' and amongst the letters he has received ; the following extracts written by a 1 well-known lucerne enthusiast give a ' racy picture of what “the king of the I fodder plants’’ means to the grower. I The writer points out that most of the i people up his way have already estab- ; lished paddocks, and they do not fed ’

inclined to root it out in favour of a new variety. Here is his own statement: “It is the rooting out that is the trouble. 1 have tried it, and failed miserably as far as killing it is concerned. My two-acre plot was getting into bad shape with grass, etc., so the winter before last 1 ploughed it with a Reid and Gray digger plough and turned it upside down, the roots sticking up in the air like a lot of parsnips. I Jet the hardest winter that we have had here for 25 years freeze it like snow’. When the ground was workable in the spring 1 put a team on with the discs and cut it four ways; then I to .tiled it and harrowed it two ways, and let it lie until it got warm enough to resow it. 1 had a 601 b. bag of seed on hand ready, but lo and behold in the first week in November I’m hanged if it didn't come up thicker than it did when it was first sown, and last year I got five cuts off it, and this year it is a perfect picture. I will be cutting it in 10 days. 1 still have half a goodsized stack left from last year, and I keep three horses and two cows, so that will give you some idea of the value of a two-acre stand of lucerne as a feed proposition. Now I ask you, would you try and root out a plant that gives these results to try a new variety? ’’ With every available acre sown with such a prolific and unkillablc plant the carrying power of Central Otago will rival if not excel the highest bearing land of the Dominion.