Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 97, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 April 1915 — Charles Pullin Thinks Alfalfa Fright Unwarranted. [ARTICLE]

Charles Pullin Thinks Alfalfa Fright Unwarranted.

For some time there has been a rumor that much of the alfalfa seed sown recently had turned out to be weeds and great alarm was being felt. Many farmers had put out alfalfa this spring for the first time and as the seed has come up and spread open for its first tiny leaves it looks very much like smartweed or heartshorn. Some are reported to have been considering the plowing up of the fields. “Uncle” Charley Pullin, however, should be accepted as unquestioned authority about alfalfa and he says that fields he has examined are not weeds but are really alfalfa, although the tender shoots do not take on much the appearance -of anything but weeds until the third leaf sprouts. Mr. Pullin brought to The Republican office samples of his own spring planting, which shows the third leaf, or, in fact, the only real leaf, the first two being more like the unfolding of the seed. He also brought a sample from a field sown for Marsh Warner a week later than his own and on which the third leaf has not developed. Although it looks very weed-like, Mr. Pullin says it is alfalfa all right and thinks the alarm that has been felt is altogether unwarranted.