266. Manufacture of sugar. ВЂ” When the factory is

ready to use the beets in a bin, the end is opened and a

section of the floor in the bottom of the V-shaped bin

removed. The beets tumble into a stream of water which

carries them to rotating paddles or brushes, where they

are washed and scrubbed. An elevator carries them to a

weighing hopper, after which they are sliced into cossettes

and steamed under pressure to dissolve out the sugar.

The juice, or gar, is mixed with lime to precipitate impuri-

ties, whereas the pulp is run outside into vats or silos for

stock-feeding. Carbon dioxide, which is now run into

the juice, unites with the lime rendering it insoluble and

causing it to settle and carry to the bottom much of the

dark, impure substances. Filters remove the small lime

particles. Lime and carbon dioxide are again added.

After filtering, sulfur-dioxid gas is passed through the juice

to remove dissolved lime. Surplus water is boiled off; and

the juice goes to crystallizing pans for further concentra-

tion. Before going to the centrifugals, which are steel cyl-

inders with perforated linings, the sirup is mixed. In the

rapidly-whirling centrifugals, the liquid is forced through

the small holes of the lining and the crystals are scraped

off and dried by a current of warm air. The liquid which

has not undergone crystallization is saved and again

concentrated for two more yields of sugar, small ones, of

course. Sacking is the last process before marketing.

MANGEL-WURZELS

267. Description. — Mangel-wurzels, or mangolds, as

they are variously called, differ from sugar-beets, in that

they are usually much larger, weighing from four to six

pounds. Generally they grow partly out of the ground,

and are very irregular in shape, being largest some dis-

252 The Principles of Agronomy

tance below the crown ; they are reddish in color, with

yellowish or pinkish flesh; and they contain approxi-

mately 12 per cent dry matter, about half of which is

sugar, whereas sugar beets are about 20 per cent solid,

four-fifths of which is sugar. Beef cattle and hogs do

well on this crop. Dairy cows can use them as a part

ration, but they demand more solids, especially protein,

than the succulent mangel can supply.

268. Use. — The mangel is the chief root crop used

for feeding in the United States, although in England

turnips and rutabagas rank first. The value of the mangel

is in its succulence. Corn silage is displacing it to some

extent, though in northern United States an3 Canada

roots deserve more consideration. One disadvantage of

roots is that for one ton of dty matter from eight to ten

tons of water must be handled. The food value of the

dry matter is high, however, because it is both palatable

and digestible. Great quantities cannot be consimied

on account of the excess of water.

269. Culture. — The land should be prepared as it is

for sugar-beets. Seeding is done with one-row drills,

with four-row drills, or by hand on small areas. They

are planted at the rate of six to fifteen pounds to the acre

and at a depth of one to two inches. Planting is usually

done in April or May. The small plants grow slowly

and it requires care in the first cultivation to prevent

covering up the rows. Mangels require the same atten-

tion as sugar-beets in regard to thinning, except that they

are left farther apart. As to cultivation and irrigation,

the same methods apply.

When frost kills the outer leaves, thereby stopping

growth, mangels are ready to harvest. They are some-

times pulled by hand or by plowing a furrow close to the

row. Beet diggers are also used to loosen the roots.

Root Crops 253

Mangels in baked soils are especially hard to dig. Yields

vary from ten to forty tonsВ»under favorable conditions.

About thirty tons may be expected under irrigation.

After the tops are removed, the roots should be stored

in a well-ventilated cellar where a temperature just above

freezing can be maintained. High temperatures are to

be avoided, particularly, to prevent heating, which is

dangerous because of the high moisture content.

TURNIPS AND RUTABAGAS

270. Description. — Turnips (Brassica rapa) and ru-

tabagas (Brassica campestris) belong to the mustard

family (Cruciferse), which include cabbage, kohlrabi,

and rape in addition to several garden vegetables such as

radish and cauliflower. Turnips are much smaller than

rutabagas. They have a much more regular shape;

and white rather than yellowish or orange flesh. They

have a much shorter growing season, and since they are

more watery they are a less valuable feed. They have

rough foliage attached to a short, flat crown, while ru-

tabaga leaves are borne on a neck, become smooth, and

take on a finish color. The rutabaga is long and ir-

regular. Both have a distinct outer layer that peels

free from the flesh. The root-systems of both are com-

paratively small.

271. Culture. — A fine seed-bed is required on account

of the root-system. Sandy soils seem best, and a moist,

cool climate is essential to best development. The seeds

are single-germed and, on this account, require much less

thinning than do the mangels or sugar-beets. The rows

should be about as far apart as beets and should be

thinned to six or eight inches apart in the row. Turnips

may be planted for winter use as late as July, as a catch-

254 The Principles of Agronomy

crop after another crop is removed, or between rows of corn.

Two or three pounds of seed to the acre are used ; rutabagas

should be sown twice as thick and usually planted in

May or early June. Planting ought to be just deep enough

to place the seed in warm, moist earth. Cultivation,

irrigation, harvesting, and storage .are the same as for

mangels save that turnips must be used in early winter.

272. Value. — In England turnips and rutabagas fonn

part of the regular farm rotation, and take the same

place for stock-feed that mangels do in Gennany. They

are grown in Canada ; in the United States, their culture

is not extensive. Turnips are used also for hmnan food.

As feed, rutabagas rank high, enabling the farmer to

greatly reduce grain rations. Five to fifteen tons of

turnips and ten to twenty tons of rutabagas are good

acre-yields. Rutabagas are valuable for beef cattle,

hogs, and sheep. Because they keep well into spring,

they serve well for this purpose, particularly where silos

are not used. They are easy to feed, since only slicing

is necessary, and this saving of time gives them consider-

able additional value. Turnips are used for sheep and

hog pasture. They pull up easily and the use of leaves

as well as roots is possible.

CARROTS (DaiLcus caroto)

273. Description. — The root of carrots may be taper-

ing, cylindrical, or short and thick ; they may be white,

yellow, orange, or reddish in color. An outer layer

breaks away from an irregular interior that is more watery

and more palatable. A medium-sized root-system spreads

outward; the leaves are finely divided; white flowers

are borne the second year in dense flat umbels ; the seeds

are cup-shaped.

Root Crops 255

В«

274. Culture and use. — Loose, sandy soils, in which

well-rotted fann manure is incorporated, make a warm,

mellow seed-bed. Seed, at the rate of four to six pounds

to the acre, is sown as soon as the groimd is in good condi-

tion. Since it is small, the seed requires shallow planting.

Rows should be about thirty inches apart to permit use

of cultivators; the carrots should stand from two to

four inches apart. If thicker, they should be thinned.

Irrigation, cultivation, harvesting, and storage are the

same as for mangels or rutabagas.

The garden crop is used principally for household pur-

poses. For forage, larger areas should be grown. When

used for forage, carrots furnish succulence and are es-

pecially desirable for horses.

SUPPLEMENTARY READING

The Sugar Beet, Ware.

Field Crops, Wilson and Warburton, pp. 412-422, 451^63.

Field Crop Production, G. Livingston, pp. 323-336.

Forage and Fiber Crops in America, T. F. Hunt, pp. 275-303.

Forage Crops, E. B. Voorhees, pp. 275-291.

Southern Field Crops, J. F. Duggar, pp. 425-456.

Cyclopedia of American Agriculture, Vol. II, pp. 539-550, 588-595,

613-623.

U. S. D. A. Yearbook for 1904, pp. 341-352.

Principles of Irrigation Practice, J. A. Widtsoe, pp. 286-298.

The Commercial Production of Sugar Beet Seed in Utah, F. S.

Harris, Utah Bui. No. 136.

American Irrigation Farming, W. H. Olin, pp. 205-228.

U. S. D. A. Farmers* Bulletins :

No. 52. Sugar-beet.

392. Irrigation of Sugar Beets.

548. Storing and Marketing Sweet Potatoes.

567. Sugar-Beet Growing under Irrigation.

568. Sugar-Beet Growing under Hmnid Conditions.

615. Leaf Spot, a Disease of the Sugar-beet.

CHAPTER XXI

ALFALFA (Medicago sativa)

Permanent agriculture must be diversified. Not only

must there be a variety of crops in rotation, but livestock-

raising must accompany crop production. Horses are

necessary as beasts of burden; cattle, sheep, and hogs

are valuable as milk- or meat-producers. Good hay is

an important factor in the successful production of live-

stock. In this alfalfa is unexcelled. In regions that

have poor shipping facUities, cattle-raising is important.

Pasturage and hay are essential on both ranch and farm.

In supplementing the native pastures of the West when

range lands could not be used in winter or when they pro-

duced little feed, alfalfa has been of inestimable value.

In fact, it made possible pioneer settlement in the West.

An early start, heavy yields of delicious forage, long life,

and adaptability to arid climates and arid soils promoted

its spread. So marked has been the effect of all these

influences that 95 per cent of the alfalfa crop of the

United States is produced west of the Mississippi.

Methods of handling the alfalfa crop are shown in

Figs: 70 to 72.

276. Name and origin. — Of thirty or forty names by

which alfalfa is, or has been, known in various parts of

the world " alfalfa " and " lucern " are most widely used.

" Alfalfa *' seems to be gaining rapidly in popularity,

largely on account of the adoption of that name in treatises

256

Alfalfa 257

and in schools. It is Arabic and means best fodder;

" lucern " is a Spanish-French word taken perhaps from

the name of the town Lucerne in Switzerland, A few of the

other names are Mexican clover, lucern clover, perennial

clover, Spanish trefoil, purple medick, cultivated medi-

cago, medicago medica, isfist, alfasafat, and monthly clover.

From the earliest time, alfalfa has been used as forage.

The Egyptians grew it; Xerxes carried it from Persia

Fio. 70. — Mowing alfalfa.

into Greece about 490 b.c., sowing it at his various en-

campments to feed his cavalry horses ; it went to Rome ;

from there to France, and Spain ; Arabs carried it to

Algeria; finally, it reached Mexico and spread widely

across parts of the Americas. In 1853, some settlers,

going to California by way of Cape Horn carried seed

from Chile to San Francisco. It extended rapidly over

California and eastward, reaching the Great Plains about

258 The Principles of Agrcmomy

fifteen years ago. Practically every state now grows it

to some extent. Although alfalfa had been introduced

into southern California from Mexico, and into New

York from Europe nearly a century before the Chile

introduction, there was no widespread cultivation.. Per-

haps the favorable conditions that gave the crop a good

start were necessary to bring its true value to the atten-

tion of fanner and ranchman.

276. Relationships. — Alfalfa belongs to the Legumi7

nosse, in which are thousands of species, among which

are peas, beans, clover, vetches, locust trees, lupines,

sweet peas, and the little astragalus common on sage-

brush lands of the mountain states. In the genus Medi-

cago, about fifty species are found.

The legume family is easily distinguished by pea-

shaped flowers, by pods that break open along both

sutiu'es, by the compound leaves, and by the tiny enlarge-

ment on the roots called nodules, or tubercles. In these

live bacteria which feed upon the plant taking free nitro-

gen from the air, and assisting greatly in the maintenance

of soil fertility. In the valleys and on the hills of the

West, there are fifty or more species of native legumes

which have probably had much to do with the great

fertility of virgin lands.

277. Roots. — Young alfalfa plants send down^ pro-

portionately long tap-roots bearing fine branching roots.

The first stem is single, and lacks the crown that develops

with age. The plant is decidedly perennial living from

four to fifty or sixty years depending on the favorableness

of the field. The roots continue to grow in well-drained

soils as long as the plant lives. This results in immense

root-systems. Roots fifteen to twenty feet in length are

common ; thirty to forty feet is occasionally reached ; a

cave in the gravel delta at Logan, Utah, exposed a root

Alfalfa 259

fifty-six feet long, while Cobum ^ reports that roots pene-

trated the roof of a tunnel one hundred and twenty-nine

feet below the surface of an alfalfa field. Water-tables

limit depth because roots will not penetrate more than

six or eight inches into a soil devoid of air.

Though they are nearly always single tap-roots, three

or four large roots sometimes displace the single one.

About half an inch is the usual diameter below the crown.

The thickness gradually diminishes until the roots are al-

most hair-like. These fine roots that do the feeding form

a network in the soil, but they do not form sod because

they are not stoloniferous. Hence, if all roots are broken,

the plant dies, since there are no buds except on the crown.

The fine roots bear, scattered in various places, small

nodules which are either separate masses or enlarge-

ments of the roots, and which vary in size from a small

pin-head to that of a pea. These may be found by

carefully digging into the root-system of almost any

alfalfa plant. Some plants, however, bear only a few.

278. Stems and leaves. — When the stems are har-

vested for hay, new shoots come out from the thickened

crown near the surface of the ground. As more and more

crops are cut, the crowns increase in size until some are

six inches across, becoming divided into two or three

distinct parts. Some make the land rough by standing

four or five inches above the surface. If a harrow splits

the crown without cutting the roots, separate plants may

form.

In spring, young stems develop as soon as the ground

is warm. These grow steadily until blossoms appear,

when they stop increasing in size in order to develop

seed. At this time, the stem may vary from six to sixty

inches in length and from one-sixteenth to one-fourth

* The Book of Alfalfa^ p. 6.

260 The Principles of Agronomy •

of an inch in diameter; twenty-four to thirty inches in

height and one-eighth of an inch in thickness are usual.

The stems are usually green, but they are sometimes

marked with red; they are hollow with white pith in

the center ; they branch frequently in the axils of leaves

which are arranged alternately. In general, first-crop

stems, containing more fibrous material, are much coarser

than those of succeeding crops. A longer period of

growth is used by the first crop, in most cases, than by

later crops.

Pinnately-compound leaves of three leaflets grow out

from the main stem and branch first on one side and then

on the other. Three leaves usually arise from one axis,

with a middle one much larger than the two side ones;

bracts indicate the presence of still other rudimentary

leaves. The central vein of the compound leaf may, at

any time, develop into branched stems, or simply divide

to form the midrib of the leaflets, which are oval-shaped,

and slightly saw-toothed at the outer end. The midrib

sends out parallel side veins which show on both surfaces,

the upper of which is a much darker green and the lower

slightly hairy.