18 
Bulletin 58. 
THE EFFECT OF THE MANURE. 
§ 24. It is usually stated and generally accepted that land on 
which a crop of beets is to be grown should not receive a dressing 
of manure immediately before being planted, but that it should 
receive the manure and be planted to some other crop between the 
manuring and the planting to beets. As already stated, I manured 
my plot heavily, 64 tons to the acre, in February, plowed it under 
in May and planted it to beets. The primary object was to observe 
its effects on the soil, but it presents an excellent example of the 
effects of manure upon the crop. I have already mentioned the 
fact that its effect upon the stand and growth of the crop was 
evident, and the tables show its effect upon the percentage of sugar 
and the coefficient of purity. The average for the fifteen samples 
taken from manured plots on October 3, 1898, is 12.79 per cent, 
sugar in the beets, with a coefficient of 78.1; the average for the 
corresponding set from the unmanured plots is 13.30 per cent, 
sugar in beets, with a coefficient of 78.4; for the samples taken 
October 15 the averages are: 13.00 per cent, sugar, 79.3 purity, and 
13.40 per cent, sugar, 79.6 purity; for October 22 we found 12.92 
per cent, sugar, 80.8 purity, and 14.18 per cent, sugar and 83.9 
purity. The averages are in harmony with our statement that 
manuring land immediately before raising a crop of sugar beets on 
it tends to lower both the sugar content and the coefficient of purity; 
but its range is only from 0.5 to 1.2 per cent, sugar and from 0.1 to 
3.1 in purity, provided we attribute the whole of these differences to 
the effect of the manure. 
§ 25. The effect upon the form of the beets was in our case a 
much more serious consideration than the diminution of the sugar 
content and the coefficient of purity. The form of the beets was 
decidedly objectionable. The bad tilth of the ground of itself 
tended to the production of ill shaped beets, but the manure made 
them very rooty, giving rise to a short, chunky beet with several 
spreading roots and a large mass of fibrous roots. This was very 
noticeable and common to all of the varieties, but shown in different 
degrees. 
§ 26. The crop of 1899 shows the same results, but the manure, 
having become more fully incorporated with the soil, effected the 
form of the beets less than in the preceding year. The percentage 
of sugar and the coefficient of purity were effected quite as pro¬ 
nouncedly as in 1898. This is evident from the tabular statement 
of the results for 1899, from which it appears that the manure 
caused a depression of as much as 2.3 per cent. (See Zehringen, 
samples taken October 18.) The effects of the manure upon the 
stand, color of the tops and development of the crop, were almost as 
