24 THE CANADIAN nOIlTICULTURIST. 



SOEGUM SUGARS. 



BY P. E. BUCKE, OTTAWA, ONTARIO. 



It may not be generally known that in 1873 the Local Legislature 

 of Ontario passed an Act offering $25,000 as a premium for the first 

 successful manufacture of beet sugar ; and in 1875 this Act was 

 supplemented by another giving an additional $7,000 annually for ten 

 years, or a total of $95,000 to carry out the above object. In spite of 

 this magnificent bonus, no one as yet has stepped forward to try and 

 earn the premium offered. 



The amount of sugars consumed in Canada is rather over than 

 under thirty pounds per capita, but at this rate, at seven cents a pound, 

 the money sent out of the country for sugar alone is $8,400,000 per 

 annum. It will readily be seen that if sugar can be grown and 

 manufactured in this country, an ample market for its consumption is 

 already established. 



Repeated attempts have been made to establish beet-root sugar 

 manufacturies in the United States, but so far the result has proved 

 that this industry has not been a success. The Early Amber Sugar 

 Cane appears to have solved the difficulty found in procuring a sugar 

 plant for the more northern parts of this continent, where the short 

 warm seasons require a plant adapted to our climate, and a plant also 

 from which the saccharine matter can be extracted with little manual 

 labor — a great desideratum in a country where wages are so high. 



In a former article on this subject, it was recommended that 

 " Early Amber" should be planted four feet apart each way ; but on 

 consulting other authorities, I find that to obtain the greatest yield 

 per acre, the distance apart advised is three feet between the rows, 

 and twenty inches between the hills. This would give space to culti- 

 vate "crossways" with a light cultivator and a single horse, a couple 

 of times before the plant was high enough to cover the ground ; or a 

 cultivator might be constructed so as to take three cross-rows at a 

 time, in which case sheet-iron guards would be necessary, so that the 

 soil would not be thrown on the growing crop. Each hill should have 

 from two to four plants, and the weight of trimmed cane per hill 

 would be from two to eight pounds, but an average of three pounds 

 per hill would give 11,700 per acre, which would make 180 gallons 

 of dense syrup, or 1,800 pounds of crystalizable sugar and 44 gallons 



