What
is alfalfa, anyway?
Ask most people what alfalfa (small "a")
is, and they're likely to reply "A kind of hay". Well,
that's sort of correct, but there's more to it.
The botanical name for alfalfa is "Medicago sativa L."
The plant actually belongs to the pea family; it is a type of legume.
A mature alfalfa plant consists of root, crown, stem, leaf, flower,
and seed. It is a naturally leafy plant; if cut early in bloom when
it is best for hay, the leaves constitute about 40 percent of the
dry weight of the hay and 60 percent stems. Around the turn of the
century, alfalfa began to be categorized in one of five groups:
common, Turkestan, yellow-flowered or "sickle", variegated,
and non-hardy.
The
goal of every alfalfa enthusiast...
Alfalfa was most likely planted and cultivated
by half-civilized man centuries before any recorded history. It
is believed to have originated in Persia. From there, it spread
to Greece, and later the Roman Empire introduced it to many areas
of the Mediterranean. When the Arabs began using alfalfa, they gave
it an Arabian form of its Persian name of "aspasti" ("to
eat"). Some historians believe that the word was something
similar to "alfalfacah". Most likely, the word "alfalfa"
is an Arabicized Persian term which means "horse fodder".
The introduction of alfalfa to the United States can be traced to
a single individual, one Wendelin Grimm, a native of the Grand Duchy
of Baden, Germany who emigrated to rural Minnesota. Since then,
its popularity has spread to most states west of the Mississippi,
in addition to many eastern states such as New Jersey, New York,
and Pennsylvania. Alfalfa is a multi-purpose crop that is used as
food sources for both animals and humans, as well by farmers as
a general fertilizer and soil enhancer.
A
well-developed plant of common alfalfa.
From
a book called "Alfalfa-Growing in the United States
and Canada". The caption reads "Jos. E. Wing and Perry
G. Holden discussing their mutually favorite topic—alfalfa."
(Them too?)
Below:
Some vintage agricultural pamphlets describing
the advantages and techniques of growing alfalfa.
 
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