These are some nice, neat, green rows. Maybe too neat. This is alfalfa. It has a tendency to grow very close together. This is not a good thing as the extra competition will limit growth. So they must be thinned.
Farmers use many different methods to do this. Here, various points have been put along a bar to remove some of the competition. We'll talk more about them later, but for now, all you need to know is what they do.
Half of the blades were wide cutting blades like you see on the left. They cut the roots of the path in front of them. The narrow point you see on the right either breaks the crown (the part on the alfalfa plant where the roots and stems meet) or pops it out of the ground. They alternated down the length of the bar. What you end up with is this.
On the left is the untouched alfalfa, on the right is the thinned alfalfa. Many of the plants are removed, leaving more space for the ones that remain. In the end, having fewer alfalfa plants that are larger produces more seeds.
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