Soils
Category:
ALFALFA
Mammoth clover may usually be successfully grown in soils well
adapted to the growth of the medium red variety. (See page 65.) This
means that it will usually grow with much luxuriance in all areas which
produce hardwood timber, and are usually covered with a clay or muddy
loam soil underlaid with clay. It will also grow with great luxuriance
in the volcanic ash soils of the irrigated valley lands of the Rocky
Mountain States, and in the loam and light loam soils of the Puget
Sound country. It has greater power than the common red variety to grow
in stiff clays, in sandy soils underlaid with clay, and in areas where
moisture is insufficient near the surface soil. In stiff clays the roots
penetrate to a greater distance than those of the medium red variety and
gather more food. Consequently, a stiff clay soil that would only
furnish a light crop of the medium red variety in a dry season may
furnish an excellent crop of the mammoth. The quality of the hay is
likely to be superior to that grown on soils altogether congenial, since
it is not likely to be over-rank or coarse.
On sandy soils underlaid with clay, and especially where the clay is
some distance from the surface, this clover is more certain to make a
stand, since the vigor of the plants enables them to gather food until
the roots go down into the clay.
In areas where the moisture is more or less deficient, the other
conditions being favorable, this clover can send its roots down into the
subsoil, where moisture is more abundant than on the surface. Because of
this power, it is better adapted than the medium red to much of the area
of Southwestern Minnesota, Western Iowa, Western Kansas and Nebraska,
and, in fact, much of the area bordering on the semi-arid country.
On clay soils that are so saturated with water that in the winter or
spring the clover is much liable to heave, there is conflict in opinion
as to whether the mammoth or the common red variety will heave the more
readily, but the preponderance of the evidence favors the view that the
roots of the mammoth variety can better resist such influences than
those of the common red.
This clover, like the common red, is not well adapted to hungry, sandy
soils, to the blow soils of the prairie, to the muck soils of the watery
slough, or to the peaty soils of the drained muskeg.
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