The Ronan pioneer. [volume] (Ronan, Mont.) 1910-1970, 1917-03-02
Ell. COOPER TALKS
ON SUGAR BETS
CONTINUED from page y

thorough crop rotation must be prac
ticed or this canbe avoided by the
use of sufficient manure or some
chemical fertilizer that will supply
the needed plant food. For instance,
wheat and beets have been success
fully grown for several years on the
same ground with the addition of
manure every two or three years.
A thorough seed bed is essential
and the proper use of the harrow,
float and roller will do this. Be pains
taking and the results will amply
repay you for your trouble. Keep
the top soil loose and pack the lower
part, thus holding the moisture till
sedding time, then float ROLAND drill
in rows 20 inches apart with the best
slope.
Cultivation should begin as soon as
the rows can be easily followed, and
should be repeated enough to keep
the surface loose and so conserve the
moisture. This is continued until the
beets are too large for 1t to be sue
cessfuly accomplished.
As soon as the beets have four
| leaves, the labOrers block with hoe
and thin to one beet every eight to
ten inches. There are two more
hoeings to keep the weeds out of the
row proper. About the first of October
the beets are ripe enough to start
digging. They are then plowed and
the laborers pull the Deets up by the
tops, knock the dirt off them, pile
them in piles and cut off the tops.
They are now ready to haul to the
receiving station.
The live stock 1ndustW in relation
to the beet sugar by-prUducts:
The live stock industry is in the
transition period from the range
to the farm. While the advance of
the pillow makes the production of
range cattle more and more difficult,
we must adjust our system of farming
to handle the half finished cattle for
market This has not been possible
here ON account of the fact that
there has been a shortage of finishing
feed of the proper quantity and price
To give AN idea f6f the amount OF food
value i'm the beet crop, I will briefly
state THAT in npfthern Colorado dur
ing tbfe past five years that the aver
beet crop per acre was S64O pounds
ofdigestable tllry matter or an equiv
assalt tof1O0 bushels of corn with 4 u
tons OF fodder or So tons of alfalfa
per acre i'm feeding value, while In
the better crops the average has beer
more. But this is not all fed as e
rule. The !beets are sold for hand
SOME profit and the tops are fec
direct or as ensilage. Then there Is
the dried pulp which allows the far
1ner ;at a distance to be able to pro-
cure an excellent feed of approXinl-
ately it's equal weight of corn
This lis SO condensed that it can be
shipped great distances and there is
ready market in the eastern part
of the country for this, where there
is a ready market for it at $50. to $40
per TON. But to stimulate stock feed
ing the company sells it at from SIS
to $40 to THE growers. This with
alfalfa and the syrup from the factory
makes an excellently balanced ration
for the finishing of cattle. So it is
that the CATTLE feeding industry was
confined toa radius of from six to
eight miles from the factory, but now
with the advent of thedried pulp it
is being extended to the very limits
of the district and the manure, the
confined to a radius of from six to
soil stimulus. is evenly distributed
instead of being collected in enormous
quantities around the factories in
stead of out In the country where 1T
was so much needed. May we soon
see the time when the manure
spreader will be more prevalent here
than the auto, for then both VIII
|soon be prevalent. 1t is now so the
man in the stock feeding country
with the odor of the dairy barn or
the feeding yard on his clothes and
manure on his shoe heels is of far
more import and gets more courtesles
from the business man than the
with the odor of gasoline in his hair.
The value of a factory to COM
munity: The coming of a factory has
always meant the raising of farm val
ues from SO per cent to 500 per cent
and an increase in value in the real
estate of the town near which 1T is
situated. The labor on 10000 acres
of beets occupies 400 families for at
least half of the year. During the
campaign the Billings factory en-