CHICORY ROOT 



CHICORY ROOT 



231 



Bulletin No. 32, pp. 14, 15 ; P. MacOwan, The 

 Castor-Oil Plant, and Its Growth to Produce 

 Machine Oil (1897), Agricultural Miscellanea, 

 Cape of Good Hope, 13, pp. 483-487; G. E. 

 Morrow and J. H. Bone, Castor Beans (1898), 

 Oklahoma Experiment Station, Bulletin No. 33, 

 pp. 13, 14 ; W. R. Shaw, The Improvement of the 

 Castor Plant (1902), Oklahoma Experiment Station, 

 Bulletin No. 54, pp. 1 -10 ; J. G. Smith, Castor 

 Bean, Hawaii Experiment Station, Press Bulletin 

 No. 2, pp. 1, 2 ; A. Zimmermann, Die Ricinus-Kul- 

 tur, Der Pflanzer (1905), 1, pp. 76-88. 



CHICORY ROOT. Ciehorium Intybus, Linn. Corrv- 

 positm. Figs. 331, 332. 



By T. Lyttleton Lyon. 



The cultivated chicory or succory has an 

 enlarged taproot resembling, in some varieties, the 

 root of the parsnip, and in others, that of the 

 forage beet, but it does not attain the size of the 

 latter. The taproots range from eight inches to 

 two feet or more in length and one to three inches 



Fig. 331. Flowers and leaves of the chicory plant. 



in diameter. The plant is perennial. The seed- 

 stalks bear clusters of brilliant blue or occasion- 

 ally pink or white ilowers (closing about noon), 

 and are nearly destitute of leaves except near the 

 base. The florets are all perfect, and all ligulate 

 or rayed; pappus a short chaffy corona. The 

 leaves and roots have a milk-white juice. When 



escaped from cultivation, chicory becomes a pestif- 

 erous weed. 



Culture. 



Chicory may be raised on almost any good land 

 north of the fortieth parallel of latitude. Local- 

 ities and soils that have demonstrated their suit- 

 ability to the production of sugar-beets are also 

 well adapted to the growth of chicory. 



Chicory grows best on a well-drained loam soil, 

 and it is important that it be free from large 

 stones and from hard-pan, because of their inter- 

 ference with the development of the long, straight 

 root that chicory should possess. The plant is 

 strongly drought-resistant. The methods of cul- 

 ture are very similar to those used in raising 

 sugar-beets, and instructions given for that crop 

 may be followed by the chicory-raiser. The only 

 essential difference is in the planting. One to one 

 and one-half pounds of seed per acre are used, and 

 should be drilled in not deeper than one-half to 

 three-fourths of an inch. The culture requires 

 very careful attention and much hand-labor. 



Uses. 



The principal use to which chicory is put, and 

 for which it is most largely grown, is that of 

 an adulterant or substitute for coffee. For this 

 purpose the taproot is dried, roasted and ground, 

 and either mixed with ground coffee or used alone. 

 In Europe its use in this way is very common. 

 Many of the European countries have laws to 

 prevent the adulteration of chicory, as it is con- 

 sidered that no other adulterant for coffee is so 

 desirable. The flavor that pure chicory imparts 

 when roasted, ground and boiled, does not resemble 

 that of coffee, but is rather bitter. However, when 

 it is mixed with a good quality of coffee in the 

 proportion of one part of chicory to three or four 

 parts of coffee, the result is very pleasing, and by 

 many persons such a mixture is considered superior 

 in flavor to pure coffee. In spite of the fact that 

 pure chicory does not resemble coffee in flavor, 

 it is used in this condition as a table beverage 

 both in Europe and in the United States, although 

 the consumption in the latter country is compar- 

 atively small. The chicory root is also used 

 medicinally and the leaves as a salad, but the 

 consumption for these purposes is small. 



Importations. 



Most of the chicory used in the United States is 

 imported from European countries. The larger 

 part of this comes from Belgium and the 

 remainder from Germany, Great Britain, Nether- 

 lands and France. The annual importation of raw 

 and prepared roots increased gradually to a max- 

 imum of 17,329,170 pounds, valued at $246,393, 

 in 1897, but dropped in 1899 to 494,616 pounds, 

 valued at f 13,414. The decrease was practically 

 all in the raw product, the importation of prepared 

 roots amounting to 399,009 pounds in 1897, and to 

 335,347 pounds in 1899. By 1904, the total impor- 

 tation had reached .the figure of 4,672,515 pounds, 

 valued at $88,487. The Twelfth Census reports a 



