CHAPTER IX 
CULTURAL METHODS 
TuE acre-yields of sugar-beets are lower in America than 
in the European countries, largely because cultural methods 
here are not so thorough. The higher price of hand labor, 
together with the availability of land, has made the 
American farmer less inclined to give to his farming opera- 
tions the painstaking care necessary for high yields. This 
condition made him slow to take up beet-raising in the 
first place, and it makes him remain a little behind the 
European farmer in the care he gives to the crop. In 
regions in which sugar-beets have been raised longest, 
farmers are learning that they are well repaid for the 
extra work they give to the beet crop. They are finding 
that for every dollar spent on better culture, they may 
obtain several dollars in return. The operations deserv- 
ing most attention in this connection are thinning and 
cultivation. The practices are suggested in Plate X, and 
in the test figures. 
THINNING 
(Plate XI) 
Preparation for thinning. 
The first requisite to good thinning is an even stand 
of beets. If this can be secured from the first seeding, so 
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