670 HORTICULTURE, FORESTRY, FLORICULTURE 



other staple crops which have been unremunerative. The yields and 

 value of the returns from a crop of cane, therefore, are of particular 

 interest. From experience and replies received from letters sent to 

 many cane growers indications are that 500 gallons of syrup per acre 

 is a reasonable product which may, with intelligent management, be 

 counted on as almost certain, while exceptional crops are known to 

 sometimes return fully twice this quantity of syrup. Such syrup 

 as described and shown can be easily made with certainty and finds 

 constant and ready demand in the market at a net return of 25 

 cents per gallon, or a gross return of $125 per acre of cane. This 

 acre of cane can be grown, and its product can be manufactured into 

 syrup at an average cost of $75 per acre, leaving a net profit on a 

 very moderate basis of $50 per acre from the crop. The same syrup 

 if marketed as sugar will easily double the returns. 



If sugar is the product in which the crop is finally marketed, an 

 estimate made on the same basis and from the same data will place 

 the reasonable yield at 3,000 pounds of sugar per acre with the 

 simple domestic methods described. This sugar finds ready sale at 

 4: l /2 cents per pound net, or a gross return of $135 per acre. In 

 addition to this the molasses obtained must be taken into considera- 

 tion, although its quality does not give it a fixed commercial status. 

 The expense of producing sugar is nearly one-tenth greater than 

 that of making syrup, or $82 per acre, leaving a net profit per acre of 

 cane manufactured into sugar of $42. Although it, therefore, appears 

 that the crop is more profitable when converted into syrup than when 

 manufactured into sugar, still the combination of the two is com- 

 mendable, at least to the extent of supplying home demand. It 

 will, therefore, be seen that the sugar cane crop on a purely com- 

 mercial basis can be made one of the most profitable resources of the 

 Southern farmer, aside from the advantage of domestic indepen- 

 dence. (Fla. E. S. B. 44.) 



