Deterioration Sugar Beets Due to Nitrates 91 
shown that while the ash of beets grown on strongly alkalized land 
may contain considerable quantities of sodic oxid, it does not follow 
that it will contain more or even as much as that of beets grown on 
ordinary soil, in fact, we found it to contain less. The abundance 
of soluble salts alone does not determine this factor, nor do I intend 
to intimate what the cause of the taking up of the sodic oxid in our 
case is. The presence of sodic oxid in the beets grown with the 
application of sodic nitrate has been attributed to the nitrate. This 
may or may not be the controlling factor. In the cases so far given 
we have with a high nitric nitrogen content a large amount of sodic 
oxid above that necessary to furnish sodium to combine with the 
chlorin. 
The magnesic oxid in the ashes of our beets is high and the 
lime low, as compared with the average data given, and both low 
compared with some recent data. The ratio of lime to magnesia in 
our beets is comparatively low, as it is usually 1 :2 and sometimes 
1 13. In the averages quoted from E. Wolff and others, this ratio is 
much more nearly 1:1. There are of course variations in this ratio 
in different analyses, but the observation is still true of the individual 
analyses that I find. Further, our beets are as a rule quite rich in 
ash constituents. The German beets seem to carry from 3 to 3.5 
percent of crude ash or about 2.3 percent pure ash in the dry sub¬ 
stance, whereas ours carry much larger percentages. It is rather 
exceptional to find a sample of beets showing less than 3.5 percent of 
crude ash and not at all uncommon to find from 5 to 6 percent. This 
is not due to the variety, to bad preparation or specifically to nitrates 
in the soil, at least, we do not find enough increase in the ash of 
beets grown with the application of nitre to justify such an infer¬ 
ence. On the contrary, the application of 250 pounds per acre 
apparently produced a decided improvement in this respect, and 
while the crude ash in the beets grown with 750 and 1,000 pounds 
per acre is higher, it does not exceed the amount found in samples 
grown without fertilizers of any kind, so while it is very probable 
that the increase in ash was in part due to the action of the nitrate, 
it is not positive enough to remove the question beyond doubt. We 
have for example three samples grown without the addition of any¬ 
thing which show 4.3, 4.5 and 5.0 percent crude ash. We have also 
two samples grown with application of 750 pounds sodic nitrate, 
these have 4.6 and 5.8, also two with 1,000 pounds per acre and 
these show 5.0 and 6.2 percent. These samples are all from the 
same land. Samples from other land, beets grown without fer¬ 
tilizers, we have 5.1, 5.0 and 6.3 percent of crude ash. All that we 
are justified in stating is that the nitrate slightly increased the ash 
content of the beets, but that it can scarcely be considered the cause 
