114 THE SUGAR INDUSTRY. 



to them, eat and die. These baits should be renewed several times at intervals of 

 two to four days, according to the state of the weather and the abundance of the worms. 



BEET SEED PRODUCTION IN THE UNITED STATES. 



At least twenty pounds of seed per acre are required for planting sugar beets. 

 At 12 to 20 cents per Ib, this represents an investment of $2 to $4 per acre for seed 

 alone. When from 3000 to 20,000 acres of land are planted to beets for each factory, 

 according to its size, it will be seen that this beet-seed question is a most important 

 one. Up to the present time the bulk of the beet seed used in America has been im- 

 ported from Germany and Prance. 



Experiments at the department of agriculture's sugar beet station at Schuyler, 

 Neb, with later work by H. H. Nicholson at the Nebraska state experiment station, 

 and the experience of our western beet growers, warrant the conclusion that Ameri- 

 ca can produce its own beet seed. The Utah Sugar Co has 57 tons of mother beets 

 laid by for planting for seed purposes early this spring, a sample of this lot being 

 illustrated on Page 32. They are packed in dry sand and kept at a low temperature 

 to prevent sprouting. These people are now raising quite a large amount of their 

 own seed, have met with great success, and expect by 1898 to cease importing beet 

 seed into Utah. Of course it is very necessary for those who are experimenting in 

 raising beet seed to try small quantities of every variety that comes to their notice. 

 Nicholson truly says that "We cannot build up a great sugar industry, stable and in- 

 dependent, until we have all its absolute requirements in and on our own home soil. 

 We must be free from all possible danger of having our seed supply tampered with, 

 and we must develop varieties of beets adapted to our soil and climatic conditions." 

 Prof Nicholson considered this matter quite fully in his address to the Nebraska 

 beet sugar association, November, '97, from which we quote the following : 



The serious difficulty and the great danger danger to the industry as a whole 

 in attempting to grow and use our own seed, lies in the lack of proper, I may be par- 

 doned for saying the lack of scientific, selection of parent beets. In this question, of 

 the selection of mothers, is the key to the whole situation. It is a purely scientific 

 question a question that has been reduced to an exact science by the great breeders 

 and seed growers of Prance and Germany. If we would not meet disaster, we should 

 sit at their feet and patiently learn the details of procedure. 



If, for example, we select this year our best beets those that will average 10 per 

 cent in sugar for seed, we will undoubtedly obtain very satisfactory results when 

 this seed is planted. By continuing this process year after year we will soon have 

 difficulty in finding 16 per cent beets the average sugar content and purity will be- 

 gin to drop, in accordance with a natural law that all animal and plant life, especially 

 those cases where special features have been artificially developed, tend to return to 

 lower forms. 



To keep ou^ beets up to a high grade, then, we must keep introducing props and 

 supports in the way of careful selection in regard to specific points. This introduces 

 into seed growing the elements of science and of expense and lifts the business into the 

 position of a specialty, to be followed only by those content to make it a lifework. 



It is a question, perhaps, whether there is yet a sufficient demand for seed in this 

 country to justify the specialist or the capitalist, or both, to enter upon the profession 



