Sugar Beets. 
7 
The quantity of seed recommended to be sown is at the rate of 
twenty pounds to the acre. This quantity is largo, but advisable in 
order to get a full stand. The seed should be put in about an inch 
and a half deep. If the ground is thoroughly wet at the time of 
planting half an inch may suffice. If the plowing is done in the 
spring it may be advisable to irrigate the ground thoroughly before 
plowing, and thus insure a good supply of moisture in the subsoil. 
If, after the seed is sown, the weather is so dry that the seed 
has to be “irrigated up,” the chances of a profitable crop are slight. 
The seed can be successfully “ irrigated up ” by running a furrow 
six inches from the drill and allowing a small head of water to run 
until it has wet the seed by soaking sideways. 
The planting may be done from the last of March till the mid¬ 
dle of June. Sugar beets sown the first of May will be ready for 
harvesting about the first of October. 
The first cultivation should take place as soon as the plants are 
up enough to enable one to follow the row. Whatever implement 
is used, it should merely scratch the surface of the ground, leaving 
it level and killing the small weeds without throwing dirt onto the 
young plants. The weeds must be kept down. The ground should 
be cultivated after each irrigation to level the ground and make a 
dirt mulch on top to preserve the moisture. 
The beet crop in Colorado will need one, and possibly two or 
three, irrigations. The last irrigation should be given about six 
weeks before the crop is mature.* In 1895 a heavy rain in Sep¬ 
tember kept the beet crop in full growth until frost, and produced a 
crop with much less than the usual amount of sugar. 
The plants should be thinned when they have four leaves, 
leaving but one plant in a place. The distance between plants 
should be eight to ten inches. There is generally but little differ¬ 
ence in the weight of the crop in cases where the beets stand six, 
eight, and ten inches apart. It is easy to grow beets weighing five 
pounds each, where the soil is rich, by thinning to twelve inches, 
lout such beets are inferior to beets averaging less than two pounds 
for sugar, and also for stock feeding. 
In thinning, the plants are cut out by means of a sharp hoe, 
leaving bunches of a few plants each, which must be thinned to a 
single plant by hand. 
The soil of Colorado is generally rich enough to grow several 
crops of beets without fertilizing, but it must eventually be fertilized 
in order to maintain the yield. 
* This is a general statement, and must be deviated from in special cases.—H 
