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STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



it only contained from six to seven per cent of sugar. This White 

 Silesian seems to have been the parent of all the sugar beets now in culti- 

 vation, and by careful training varieties have been secured containing 

 nearly three times the amount of sugar found in the original beet. Many 

 kinds of beets are in the market that are called sugar beets which are 

 very far from the highly developed and specialized sugar beets required 

 for manufacturing purposes. It should be borne in mind that many so- 

 called ''sugar beets" will not profitably make beet sugar. 



Some mistakes have been made by Michigan farmers this season by 

 planting seeds that were not true sugar beets. Beets have been sent 

 to the College for analysis that were red, pink or orange in color, 

 whereas the real sugar beet is white, and roots of other colors show 

 either a different variety of beet or a degenerate seed. Mangel wurzels 

 of large size have been sent as specimens of sugar beets. 



Fig. 1.— Kleinwanzlebener Sugar Bpot, Wiley, Farmers' Bulletin 

 52, United States Department of Agriculture. 



To guard against such mistakes, the Experiment Station required the 

 name of the variety of beet used in the experiment. Another object to 

 be secured in knowing the name of the beet in each experiment is to find 

 what kind of beets will give the largest product of sugar and the largest 

 average yield of beets on any kind of soil, or in any district. This infor- 

 mation will be of value to the farmer and also to the manufacturer. 

 The Station tries to gather valuable information, not simply to gratify 

 curiosity, and hence has insisted on the name of the beet. 



