Deterioration Sugar Beets Due to Nitrates 145 
analyses of the varieties at the time of defoliation and at the time of 
hai vest. 1 he defoliation evidently caused a stoppage in the devel¬ 
opment of the beet; it did not depress the phosphoric acid in the 
beet, it did not increase the total nitrogen in the beet, but it did 
arrest apparently almost completely, the elimination or transforma¬ 
tion of the nitric nitrogen. The extent of the defoliation was ex- 
ti erne almost complete and undoubtedly arrested some functions of 
the plant completely, while others were disturbed to a less extent 
vV e see for ^stance that the beets attained to a fair size, 791 and 701 
grams, untrimmed, and this is the average weight of 50 beets in 
It was very advisable, in fact quite necessary, that the experi¬ 
ments of 1911 should be made before any interpretation of the re¬ 
sults of 1910 should be undertaken, for however pronounced the 
effects of the nitrates may have been there would be misgivings 
e>en in our own minds, as to the part Cercospora beticcla, the leaf- 
spot, might have played and what the nitrates had really effected. 
re experiments of 1911 enable us to state, as we have done, pretty 
tuiJy, what the nitrates did even when applied at a period when the 
rate of appropriation of nitrogen by the beet had, according to Prof 
Kemy, already abated very materially and was becoming still 
slower _ Unfortunately our check field practically failed us in 1910 
nevertheless, not to such an evtent as to be wholly useless, though its 
value is very much less than we had hoped it would be. 
The application of 250 pounds of nitrate per acre, 1 April, just 
tefoie planting the seed, resulted in an increase in the yield of roots 
and sugar, and the general quality of the beets was very good crop 
16.85 tons, sugar in beets 16.85 percent. The phosphoric acid in 
the beets was low and the alkalis relatively high. The total nitrogen 
was relatively low, the ratio of proteid nitrogen to the total was bet¬ 
ter than 50 percent; in the juice, according to Ruempler, it was si 
percent, the nitric nitrogen was low for the Arkansas Valley beets 
o.oot.44 percent ; the injurious ash and nitrogen per 100 sugar a'so 
low the former 2.1267, the latter 0.36424. The beets from this 
held were among the best analyzed in 1910 and were really very 
good beets. We have elsewhere stated that these results are not in 
accord with others obtained with smaller applications of nitrate but 
the soil was different. 
With the application of 500 pounds per acre the field results 
were good, crop 15.52 tons per acre, sugar in beets 15.8 percent, but 
the effects upjn the composition of the beet were easily recognized 
m the analytical results by an increase of the total ash, a very mod¬ 
erate amount of phosphoric acid, high alkalis, particularly soda, a 
marked increase in the total nitrogen, a lower ratio for the proteid 
to the total nitrogen, evident in the juice as well as the beet, a very 
