194 [Senate 



Expense of cultivation : — 



lUbs. seed, |0.94 



Planting by hand, 3 days, 1 .50 



Hoeing first time, 3 days, 1 .50 



Plowing second time, with one horse, .37 



Hoeing and thinning out, 5 days, 2 .50 



Pulling and burying, 7 days, 3 .50 



7^ loads manure, 50 cts., 3.75 



$14.06 

 Credit by 328 h bushels sugar beets, 12 ^ cts. , 41.06 



Nett profit, i $27.00 



CLINTON COUNTY. 



Extract from a communication of Robert E. Keese, of Ausable, 

 Clinton County, on the culture of beets and turneps, to the Clinton 

 County Agricultural Society. 



I have raised, the present season, about one and a half acres of roots, 

 consisting of mangel wurtzel, white sugar beet, and ruta baga, in two 

 fields separated only by the highway. The larger of the two fields, 

 contained 180 rods of ground ; soil, about half sandy loam, and the other 

 half gravelly and black loam ; the whole resting on a subsoil of clay. 

 The field was greensward, turned over the last days of the fifth month, 

 in lands two rods in width, making five equal divisions of the piece ; no 

 manure was applied ; the ground was thoroughly harrowed, and planted 

 about the 10th of the 6th month, which was quite too late, as from 

 dryness, the plants did not start soon. A heavy fall of rain succeed- 

 ing, saturated the ground, and they were nearly " drowned out." 

 Excessive drouth followed ; the yield, however, though light, was 

 far better than might have been expected. Two of the five lands, or 

 two-fifths of the piece, were planted with mangel wurtzel, and pro- 

 duced about 200 bushels ; full three-fourths of which, or 150 bush- 

 els, grew on about one-half of the ground, or 36 rods ; the remain- 

 der being very much injiVied by the wet and drouth. By this esti- 

 mate, the better part yielded at the rate of nearly 700 bushels to the 

 acre. Two other of the five lands were planted with the sugar beet, 

 but the seed was poor and but little came. Some time afterward, the 

 deficiencies thus occasioned, were supplied by transplanting in ruta 

 baga. But this being done quite too late in the season, the yield was 

 light — although this part of the field was less injured by the wet and 

 drouth than the other ; the product being about 150 bushels of ruta 

 baga, and very few beets. The remaining one-fifth was planted with 

 ruta baga, in drills 18 inches apart — the plants being subsequently 

 thinned out from 4 to 8 inches (they should have been from 8 to 10 

 inches at least,) in the drills. Produce, 150 bushels. 



