THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE 



221 



EXPERIMENT IN THE CULTIVATION OF THE BEET-ROOT. 



[translated from the FRENCH OF THE " JOURNAL d'aGRICULTURE PRATIQUE."] 



Sir, — At your request I send you the extract of a 

 letter which I have lately addressed to the Agricultural 

 Society of Rochelle, on an experimental culture of beet- 

 root iu the South. 



I am aware that people are apt to mistrust a little 

 such accounts, as eccentric gasconade, without consider- 

 ing, that whilst mankind themselves differ, there is also 

 the difference of climate, and of the fertility of the soil. 



I have drawn about 500 quintals of SO kilogrammes, 

 and even, to be more exact, 550 from 1,000 metres of 

 land, which is the space I usually devote to my different 

 experiments. * 



In order to ensure such a result, which corresponds with 

 275,000 kilogrammes per hectare, it is necessary to at- 

 tend to the following eight conditions : — 



1. Trench the land deeply. 



2. Apply to it a large quantity of manure. 



3. Confine the plants strictly to one foot every way. 



4. Water, by immersion, every fifteen days, when rain 

 does not fall. 



5. Give a second tilth after each irrigation, so far as 

 is possible. 



6. Prune those plants which are disposed to run to 

 seed. 



7. Abstain from stripping off the leaves. 



8. Draw them not till the end of November, when all 

 vegetation has ceased. 



First. Deep digging allows the plant its greatest de- 

 velopment in the length of the root, and probably also 

 in all its proportions. 



Second. My land (still 1,000 metres) was manured 

 with twenty cubic metres of good dung, and three mea- 

 sured quintals t of colza cake. 



Third. The seed-plot was made on a hot-bed under 

 glass, and the seed put in on the 1st January. I 

 planted them out in April, when they were about the 

 size of the finger, and when others were sowing the 

 seed. This early forcing is essential to success, the roots 

 having had thereby nine months of vegetation when I 

 drew them at the end of November ; and as they gain 

 one concentric circle every fifteen days, they had acquired 

 eighteen at that period, which is six more than the sown 

 beet-root ; and as the last sixjare the external rings, the 

 volume of the beet roots had more than doubled. 



Fourth. The beet-root not throwing out fibrous roots 

 to a distance, it is a plant that may be set close together 

 upon the land : I hid observed in my seed-bed that 

 plants proceeding from the same hole, when the burying 

 was incomplete, came up, notwithstanding their prox- 

 imity, as fine as the others. 



Fifth. In order to make a seed-bed complete, irriga- 

 tion is indispensable with us. Circumstances having de- 

 prived me of the power of irrigation the last two years, 

 I no longer obtained the produce I announced to you ; 

 at the same time a certain discretion is required in the 

 employment of water ; otherwise the roots, in growing, 

 are apt to become hollow. 



Sixth. A second hoeing is necessary after the irri- 

 gation, because the sun and the wind dry so rapidly 

 here, and it is beneficip*. to break at the surface the 

 homogeneity of the soil. However, in this close and 



* This result gives 308^ tons per hectare, or about 123 tons 

 pet acre. — Translator. 

 t About 6 cwt. — Translator. 



luxuriant cultivation, the plant is not long in covering 

 the ground with its domes of verdure ; and it becomes 

 difficult, after the third hoeing, to execute a fourth. But 

 neither the sun nor the wind any longer affect the root, 

 which undoubtedly, under these shades, then enters into 

 those gaseous combinations which accelerate the vege- 

 tation of the plant, without the intervention of the hand 

 of man. 



These beet-roots, which are thus forced, are very 

 liable to run to seed ; but by cutting off the stalk when 

 it makes its appearance, the movement is stopped, and 

 the root steadily increases in size like the others. 



Seventh. Stripping off the leaves, especially during 

 the dog-days, stops the development of the plant. 



Eighth. Do not draw them until November, when all 

 vegetation has ceased. In October and November the 

 roots double their weight if the season proves warm. 



Such is the secret of our 275,000 kilogrammes per 

 hectare ; and the inference is easy to be drawn from it, 

 5,500 days' food for any animal of whatever kind. For 

 I have never been able to make any cows eat more than 

 50 kilogrammes (I cwt.) per day. They are small, it is 

 true ; but they grew fat upon that allowance. 



I am delighted at the publicity given to my attempts, 

 for they would remain here, in the South, a long time 

 isolated, where the farmers appear, more and more, to 

 lose sight of cattle feeding, and devote themselves to in- 

 dustrial cultivation, which is upheld only by the pur- 

 chase of artificial manures. 



The Penitentiary of Mattray, at my desire, has also 

 cultivated beet-root by the Koecklin method. His first 

 experiment has doubled his produce without any addi- 

 tional manure. He obtained more than 80,000 kilo- 

 grammes per hectare. 



At Grenoble my brother has seen, in the month of 

 September, a field of beet-roots cultivated by the same 

 method, the roots of which had reached the average of 

 14 kilos (351bs.) ; and, allowing only 20,000 to the 

 hectare, they had already exceeded the amount I have 

 indicated. But that was only in September, and they 

 had still four concentric rings on the outer surface to 

 form ; and my produce would be exceeded, on an ex- 

 tended scale, in those lands so rich naturally, and satu- 

 rated with manure for centuries, and in which they cul- 

 tivate hemp almost without intermission. 



It is, therefore, by a warm climate, abundant manure, 

 irrigation, forcing, and good hand-labour, that my 

 result is to be attained. 



If the roots have not nine months of growth, of heat 

 and moisture, those grand principles of vegetation are 

 in weak proportions : if frequent storms render the ra- 

 diation less powerful, the ultimate result would un- 

 doubtedly be different. 



This limit which I have now reached, and which ap- 

 pears extraordinary, is not, be well assured, the last we 

 shall hear of intensive culture. We have seen, on the 

 bank of the Canal of St. Gilles, on those lands which 

 yield such prodigious harvests of grapes, a beet- root 

 weighing 60 kilogrammes (1501bs.). How many would 

 be required to make 10,000 quintals* (500 tons)? and 

 can we not study, and realize afterwards, the conditions 

 which have produced this phenomenon .' 



This question has given rise to a discussion similar to 



7,466 roots,— Translator. 



R 



