EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 



199 



EXHAUSTIVE EFFECTS OF THE SUGAR BEET CROP. 



Below is a table showing the difference in the average of three unfertilized plots for 

 three years with three similar plots for the same period which were treated with a 

 normal application of fertilizers. The object of making this comparison is to show the 

 importance of giving some return to the land in payment for the beet crop. The mis- 

 take of comparing yields one year with another is here at once apparent, for it will be 

 noticed that even the unfertilized plot in 1900 gave larger yield than the fertilized plot 

 of 1899. Then the sudden drop in 1901 due largely to the lateness of the season at 

 which the seed was planted and the ether climatic conditions prevailing that year is 

 further proof that comparisons can only be made all in one season and where conditions 

 are analogous. 



The relative decrease in yield of the unfertilized plots as compared with those receiv- 

 ing annually an application of fertilizer increases as the experiment progresses, it 

 being but 1.25 per cent the first year, 11.25 per cent the second year, and 13.85 per cent 

 the third year. The exhaustive quality of the sugar beet crop was brought out to some 

 extent in Bulletin No. 188, page 101, where it was shown that neither beans nor potatoes 

 were so exhaustive as were the sugar beets. Observations on the growth of a corn crop 

 in one of the College fields the past year where one end of the field had been sown the 

 previous year to sugar beets and the other to cow peas showed a marked difference in 

 the growth of the corn. At the time first tasseling the corn on the cow pea ground was 

 fully one foot taller than on the ground which previously had grown sugar beets, and 

 the tasseling was fully a week in advance. A similar observation was made on two 

 strips of corn in another field, one-half of which had grown on sugar beet ground the 

 year previous, and the other half upon potato ground. There was a marked difference in 

 the appearance of the two plots, decidedly in favor of the potato ground. Owing to the 

 imperfect germination of the seed corn the yields of the two strips were too irregular 

 to admit of comparison. 



