202 



ARID AGRICULTURE. 



BEET 

 GROWING 



INTENSIVE 



ADAPTING 



CROPS 



IMPORTANT 



cient to meet the expense of producing it and 

 provide a profit. 



Raising sugar beets is intensive farming. 

 They cannot be successfully produced except by 

 intensive methods. On this account sugar beet 

 culture introduced into a community which has 

 generally practiced extensive cropping, means 

 learning something new. The farmer must put 

 aside the idea that his experience with other 

 crops will enable him to grow sugar beets suc- 

 cessfully. He must follow the experience of 

 those who have long practiced beet culture if he 

 hopes for success. 



The German who said that the Americans 

 could not grow sugar beets because they would 

 not get down on their knees to hoe, has given us 

 some idea of the essential difference between beet 

 culture and the culture of our ordinary crops. 

 While there is a right method of beet culture, un- 

 doubtedly general practice may be somewhat 

 modified by the peculiar conditions of each local- 

 ity. Experience in other places is valuable, but 

 not always infallible. 



We have much to gain by creating races and 

 varieties of plants which will be fully at home 

 and adapted to our soil, climate and system of 

 irrigation. It has taken long years of careful 

 breeding and cultivation to produce the sugar 

 beet of today. The amount of sugar it contains 



