Sugar beet growing in Iowa, 1897.

Abstract

<p>A widespread and general interest has been manifested in sugar beet growing during the past season. Through the cooperation and assistance of the United States department of agriculture, the Iowa Station distributed over 1,500 pounds of seed. The requests for this seed came from every county of the state. Instructions for preparing the soil, planting and growing the crop and forwarding samples for analysis have been sent with each package of seed, and nearly 1,200 samples of beets have been analyzed in our chemical laboratory, under the direction of Dr. J. B. Weems, the station chemist, and the result of analysis reported by mail. The samples returned for analysis came from about one-half of the parties who received seed, owing to numerous failures in obtaining a satisfactory crop of beets. The results presented herein are tabulated by counties instead of by individual growers. A more detailed report would be desirable, but the limited funds available for conducting and publishing the results of our experiment station work render this course necessary. For this reason a great deal of other matter pertaining to the work is necessarily eliminated from this report.</p>