The Goodland republic. [volume] (Goodland, Kan.) 1891-1907, 1895-08-30
TIE S6BR&ET
4 PRODUCE PARTICULARLY ADAPT
ED no WESTERN FARMS.

ED no WESTERN FARMS,
Substantial Returns Every Season Should
Make Sugar Bets FayOrits Crop.
General Interest Now Being Taken Be
Cause Of Big Crops in the Past Three
Years of Drouthy Weather When Other
Products Faiied-Its Cultivation and
Adaptibilisy TO Western Soils,
The enthusiasm that has lately de-
yeloped in some sections of the west
over sugar beet culture has been fully
justified by the success Of the industry
the past three seasons. It has been
known by the reading public in a
general way that sugar beets do not
require as much moisture as do most
crops. 1t has been believed that in the
western country where too much rain
fall is almost an impossibility, the
sugar beet would be a profitable crop,
because there was no danger Of the
beets being ruined by excessive rains
during the maturing season. The past
three seasons have demonstrated that
the sugar beet is the one crop most
needed in the west, a crop sure to ma
ture even in the dryest seasons known,
and equally certain to make a large
yield when the timely rains put in an
appearance. During the dry seasons
of 1893 and 1894 in some portions of
I the west the sugar beets made a good
yield. The crop this year is a magnifi-
cent one, the largest ever known. In
fact, the past three seasons have demon
strated that sugar beets are profit
able crop under ali circumstances
very profitable in a good season and
fairly profitable the dryest year. This
is partly accounted for by the fact that
while in the dry seasons the beets are
small, they contain an extra large per
cent of saccharine matter.
= Quite a number of towns are now
moving in the matter of securing sugar
beet factories It is shown that all
that is necessary to interest capital in
the matter is to secure pledges from
farmers to plant a certain number Of
acres. This number varies with the
demand for a small factory or a large
plant 1t is possible to have small
factories for reducing beets to syrup
in many communities and shipped to
central refneries. There is no ques-
ton about the profits for the business
nor the profits to the farmers. It is
only matter Of doubt as to whether
the beets will be planted.
Conditions are changing Until a
few years ago the ambition of the
western farmer was to possess and
cultivate very large tract of land. 1t
was a too common a practice to tickle
around on the surface of the soil,
scatter the seed and trust to luck to
raise a crop. If the heavens Wept cop
iousiy a big crop was raised. If they
did not, and it usually happened that
the water supply was short of what
was hoped for, the farmer would con-
graduate himself that he had had one
chance in a hundred of making big
Speculation, anyway, and having raised
rEenought to live on another year he
would soon be in shape to try it all
over again. But for two years in sue
. eession crop failures forced the con-
clusion that speculative farming brings
with it the dangers Of hungry families
and property sacrifice. The merry
jinple of ia little farm well titled" has
caught hold of the western farmer and
is changing his methods. A sure thing
of q fair degree of prosperity every
year-of a living, of comforts better
than a prospect of an occasional enor-
nous crop. In harmony with this
changing of ideas comes the demand
for more thorough cultivation of the
soil, for sub-sOiling, for irrigation and
for the cultivation of crops like alfalfa
and sugar beets that do not need more
than the usual rainfall, and that are
sure to make at least a fair crop the
dryest season. This is the keynote to
permanent and substantial prosperity.
Only few sections of the west, as
yet, have been interested in sugar beet
culture, but it is now known that there
is plenty of money behind the matter
of constructing factories, O there is
money to furnish seed to farmers, and
in these portions Of the west where
crops have been failure for two years
it is probable that farmers could get
advances on their crop next season
Ahorsr &c ~, vqfcis 0f f.flvTro % IL
sugar beet crop.
The United States consumes four
billion pounds Of sugar annually, all
Of which we should produce here, thus
keeping in circulation among our own
people about S200,000,000 a year that
we send TO foreign nations. 1t would
require nearly one thousand factories
to supply our own consumption, each
factory consuming $50 tons of beets,
five car loads Of coal, three of lime
stone and one Of coke every twenty
four hours. Such an industry would
furnish labor to hundreds of thousands
of people, divide up our farms into
small acreages, give US a better grade
Of farming attended with less risk,
and enable farmers to produce from
acres the same amount of money
IS Is now produced from 100 acres Of
corn, it relieves him of all speculative
influences, and the crop being con-
tFaojed for long before the seed is
planted leaves only the question as to
s what tonnage and how rich beet can
be produced, this depending entirely
: upon the season, land and care used in
s cultivation.
at Omaha thirty.seven tons have
been raised to the acre, worth $3.50
8 per ton at the factory, at an outlay of
: less than $50. In California ~ tons
q have been raised to the acre; at Nor
folk and Grand Island the largest ton
g mage last year was q tons to the acre.
S It's fair to assume that under favor
s 5ble conditions an average crop will
q gieid ID to is tons, and as farmers learn
more of this crop, getting their ground