The Sugar-Bect Plant 25 



to four feet tall. They bear the flowers and seeds and 

 most of the lea\Ts. The first year the leaves are large and 

 usually erect, although they sometimes form a sort of 

 rosette on the ground. This varies with the strain of 

 beet and also with the conditions of growth. The weight 

 of the leaves is about one-half that of the root. The pro- 

 portion of leaves is greater for small than for large beets. 

 The leaves on the seed-stalk the second year are much 

 smaller than those growing from the beet crown the first 

 year. 



The fleshy root (Fig, 4) is an enlarged taproot, thickest 

 just below the crown and gradually tapering into a slender 

 root which may extend several feet into the soil. Branch- 

 ing from the taproot are numerous secondary roots that 

 extend as feeders throughout the soil. These secondary 

 roots are clustered in two rows extending down the beet 

 usually in a spiral direction, although frequently straight. 

 The upper six or eight inches of the old beet are almost 

 free from the secondary roots. One examination showed 

 the greatest branching between eight and fourteen inches 

 in depth. Attached to the secondary roots are number- 

 less root-hairs which absorb water and plant-food from 

 the soil. 



The beet is made up of a series of concentric rings of 

 alternating lighter and darker color shown in Plate IV. 

 These rings are composed of two kinds of parenchyma 

 cells, the ones with a denser finer structure being richer in 

 sugar and dry matter. The larger coarser cells are richer 

 in water. For this reason, beets with a larger number of 

 small compact cells are richer in sugar than those in which 

 the larger water-storage cells predominate. Although 



