121 
Deterioration Sugar Beets Due to Nitrates 
The analyses indicate that these beets are very good ones, in 
fact there is but one factor in this crop that we could wish were bet¬ 
ter, that is the weight of the crop. The beets are high in sugar and 
comparatively low in total nitrogen. The ratio of proteid nitrogen 
to the total, is much higher than in a great many of our beets. The 
ratios for the injurious ash and injurious nitrogen per ioo of sugar 
are low. The pure ash is also lower than we usually find it in our 
beets. At first sight it seems proper to attribute these improved 
qualities to the green manure. I am not at all disposed to draw any 
conclusions fiom these results. They would have to be extended 
and corroborated before it would be proper to do so. 
In presenting the results of our attempt to find out whether 
there was such a marked difference in the yield, sugar content and 
coefficient of purity of beets attacked by the leaf-spot in varying 
degrees of severity that we might be justified in asserting the nature 
and extent of the injury due to this cause, I remarked, that there 
seemed to be a relation between a small yield and a high sugar con¬ 
tent rather than between any other recognizable factors. It is not 
evident that this is equivalent to saying that this relation exists be¬ 
tween the size of the beets and the sugar content, though such may 
be the fact, for though the average weight of the beets analyzed was 
not far fiom one pound each, the yield of about 8.2 tons per acre 
with a stand of 32,000 beets per acre shows that many of the beets 
were small, less than one-half pound in weight. I have the record 
of three other fields planted to Z. Z. Klinewanzlebener seed and to 
which buint lime, 6 tons, waste lime, 30 tons, and stockyard manure, 
30 tons per acre had been applied, and we have low yields and high 
sugar percentages for the year of application and also for the suc¬ 
ceeding year. These beets were not analyzed but the sugar content 
as shown by the factory returns, especially for the second year, 17.2, 
17.9 and 16.0 leave no room for doubt but that they were good beets. 
It is for such reasons that I am not inclined to attach much import¬ 
ance to the good results obtained in the green manuring experiments. 
The piofit on such a crop of beets is too small to make it desirable 
for us. to try to raise such crops simply because the beets are good, 
but it is not clear why these crops are not larger. Thirty tons waste 
lime or the same quantity of stockyard manure furnishes a heavy 
dressing of phosphoric acid, in the former, 528 pounds, and of both 
phosphoric acid and nitrogen in the latter case, 492 pounds of phos¬ 
phoric acid and 360 pounds of the nitrogen, which ought to bring 
about the production of more than 6 or 8 tons of beets per acre. It 
is, however, true that these beets, grown with the application of 
green manure and on ground that was in a bad physical condition, 
are among the best, if not the very best, beets which we sampled in 
1910. 
