452 



ROOT CROPS 



increasing toward the outside and ends. The per cent of dry 

 matter also follows the same principle, being greater near the outside. 

 The same is true of potatoes, where the percentage of dry matter is 

 about two per cent lower in the center. 



Composition. All beets contain sugar. The commercial 

 manufacture of sugar from beets was first developed by Napoleon in 

 1825. At that time beets contained only six per cent sugar, but since 

 then by careful selection the sugar content has been increased to four- 

 teen or sixteen per cent, and individual beets frequently yield above 

 twenty per cent sugar. Stock beets usually contain six to eight per 

 cent sugar. 



FIG. 193. Mangel beets, long form. 



Dry matter in stock beets ranges from ten to sixteen per cent, in 

 comparison with potatoes containing sixteen to twenty per cent. 



Preparation of Land. Beets require rather deep fertile soils. 

 It seldom pays to plant stock beets on any but rich soil, since the 

 cost of growing, in seed, thinning, hoeing, and cultivating is so high 

 that the crop must be large. For sugar beets the land should not be 

 too rich in available nitrogen, as it will cause them to grow rank and 

 be poor in quality. 



Land is generally plowed deeper for beets than other crops, not 



