EXPERIMENTAL STATIONS — TUENIP CROP 1882. 



367 



and least important comes water. This will be found in the 

 accompanying tables, Nos. III. and IV,, where along with the per- 

 centage of water and solids there are given the total weight per 

 acre and the weight of solid matter per acre produced by each 

 half plot. 



The proportion of water in turnips is usually stated roughly 

 at 90 per cent., but this number, while it may be pretty near the 

 mark for swedes, is too low for turnips, as may be seen from the 

 average composition of the thirty plots at both stations. 



One or two per cent, makes little difference to the total pro- 

 portion of water, and if the water were the valuable constituent 

 here, the slight variations seen on these tables would scarcelv be 

 worth regarding; but it is with the solids we have to do. All the 

 feeding material of a turnip is contained in the solids, and the 

 water is only water and nothing else. Many farmers find it 

 difficult to credit this, and are fain to believe that there is 

 something more than water in the water of turnips. The term 

 water in the above analyses does not refer to sap, for the sap of 

 turnips contains a considerable quantity of solid matter in 

 solution. It is only the actual water of that sap which is 

 reckoned in these figures. 



The intimate manner in which the water of turnips is com- 

 bined with the solid matter enables the latter to be easily eaten 

 and digested, but the proportion of water in turnips is excessive 

 from a feeding point of view, and any manurial treatment which 

 has the effect of increasing the proportion of solid matter in 

 turnips, even to a slight extent, is of importance to feeders. 



We see here that the turnips at Pumpherston were much 

 richer than those at Harelaw. They were a firm solid turnip, 

 such as stock-feeders like, but they were small, so that the 

 increase in quality was got at a sacrifice of quantity. The Hare- 

 law turnips were soft, and many of them very spongy, but they 

 were of good average size, and the quantity of solid turnip matter 

 grown per acre was nearly double that produced on the poorer 

 station. 



Increase of quantity of solid matter per acre does not 

 altogether compensate for decrease in percentage of solids, for 



