FURTHER EXPERIMENTS ON THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF ROOT 



CROPS FOR NEW YORK 



Edward R. Minns 



The growing of root crops as feed for live stock can never become so 

 important in New York State as the production of corn for silage. The 

 value of mangels, carrots, and rutabagas as succulent food is generally 

 acknowledged, but it is their comparatively high cost of production that 

 will always limit the culture and use of even the best varieties. 



In 1904 the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station began 

 a study of cultural methods and varieties of root crops. For three con- 

 secutive years field experiments were made with numerous varieties of 

 mangels, sugar beets, carrots, rutabagas, turnips, parsnips, and kohl-rabi. 

 Those experiments are reported in bulletins 243 and 244. The trials were 

 made on small plats and there was no attempt to show a definite cost re- 

 lation between the production of nutrients in root crops and the nutrients 

 in com silage. Two objects of the experiments, as stated in Bulletin 243, 

 were as follows: 



(i) To determine whether root crops may be economically raised as a 

 substitute for western grains, especially in the more northerly parts and 

 higher altitudes of the State; 



(2) To determine the best cultural methods. 



A summary of the results states: " No doubt, in general, the greatest 

 economy will be practiced by growing cabbages, rutabagas, and mangels 

 for succession harvesting and feeding, more especially on farms where 

 sheep and swine are kept." Judged on a dry-matter basis, it was found 

 that sugar beets gave the highest average yield of dry matter. Mangels, 

 half-sugar mangels, and rutabagas followed in order. One of the lessons 

 deduced was: " A greater average yield of dry matter per acre may be 

 obtained from mangels, half-sugar mangels, sugar beets, and rutabagas 

 than from an average yield of corn. While it costs somewhat more per 

 pound to produce this dry matter, yet it is quite probable that the higher 

 digestibility and palatability of roots onsets this lesser cost of corn." 

 Our recent experiments do not confirm this statement. 



The fertilizer requirements of mangels were studied for two consecu- 

 tive years on .the Dunkirk clay loam soil of the Cornell University farms. 

 The experiments were made during 1907 and 1908 and the results pub- 

 lished in Bulletin 267, together with those obtained by tests of cultural 

 methods for mangels and rutabagas in 1907. In these experiments acid 

 phosphate and nitrate of soda were found to be the most profitable fer- 



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