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The Cultivation of Sugar-Beet. 
On the estate of Groena, in the Dukedom of Anhalt, which com- 
prises about 700 or 800 acres of fertile land, they did not plant any 
beetroot before 1837, and then up to 1853 only a few acres for 
trial. In 1853, however, they began to plant about 150 acres every 
year, and in 1856 the results proved conclusively that they had got 
as much corn as they had formerly done when the whole area of the 
estate was devoted to its cultivation. On another estate, that of 
Ossnarsleben, near Bernburg, which comprised about 1,000 acres of 
fertile soil, they generally had a little more than half of the area in 
grain. They found, after introducing the cultivation of beetroot, 
that they had an increase of about 2 per cent, in the grain crop. 
In France, in the Arrondissement of Valenciennes, not only was the 
cereal crop increased by the introduction of beetroot, but they 
were able to feed 11,500 head of cattle instead of 700. The conclu- 
sion to which these facts point is that beetroot, so far from being 
an exhausting crop, enriches the soil if it is grown with a due 
regard to rotation. It is claimed that not only is it a paying crop 
in itself, apart from the question of the value of its fibre as food for 
cattle, but that it improves the condition of the soil for wheat or 
other cereal production. 
As to the frequency with which the sugar-beet crop should 
occupy the land, the best authorities consider it should come once 
in six or eight years. Dr. Eisbein, who is Professor of Agri- 
culture at Heddesdorf, near Neuwied, recommends the following 
rotation : — First year, beetroot dressed with stable manure ; second 
year, oats or barley ; third year, clover and grass ; fourth year, 
wheat ; fifth year, peas, beans, or other leguminous plants or pota- 
toes, dunged with stable manure ; and sixth year, rye. An alter- 
native succession would be : First year, beetroot with stable 
manure ; second year, barley or spring wheat ; third year, clover or 
grass ; fourth year, wheat ; fifth year, potatoes ; sixth year, oats ; 
seventh year, leguminous plants such as peas, beans, ifcc, with stable 
manure ; and eighth year, rye. 
It is important to recognise that, in the extraction of sugar from 
the beet, all that is taken away from the root is the carbonaceous 
material which the latter obtains from the atmosphere. Practically 
the whole of the ingredients which the plant takes from the soil, 
except a small percentage of salts, remain in the refuse after extrac- 
tion of the sugar, and are therefore directly available for the feeding 
of stock. Another point of interest is that the rather long interval 
between two beet crops in the rotation is by no means due to the 
circumstance that land could not profitably carry beetroot much 
more frequently, but is owing to the fact that it is liable to the 
attack of certain nematode parasites which would be unduly encour- 
aged were the crop repeated too often. 
An indispensable adjunct to the profitable cultivation of sugar- 
beet would obviously be the convenient proximity of a factory to 
which the roots could be sent. On the Continent generally, where 
beetroot is grown, a number of farmers in each district club 
together and build a factory, each farmer undertaking to deliver to 
