The twice-a-week Twin Falls times. (Twin Falls, Idaho) 1916-1918, 1918-03-21
The Sugar Beet and It's
Relation to Good Farming
E. j. Iddings
Dean Agriculture, University of Idaho

The sugar beet is doing a great
work in agricultural education. II
comes to an agricultural district, that
is suited to it's culture, bearing the
message for better farming and is
the primary incentive sooner or later
in the development of a live stock
feeding industry.
Beets Mean Better Farming
In order to be highly successful
year after year with sugar beets the
farmer must employ cultural methods
that are essential to maximum pro-
duction and must plan definite meas
ures for retaining soil fertility. Soon
after the arrival of the more thorough
cultivation, more careful use of irrl-
CATION water, careful conservation
and application to the soil of farm
manures, and the seeding of legumes,
not essentially for hay, but primarily
flor fertilization as a part of well
planned and balanced system of crop
rotation.
Ordinarily we think of the sugar
beet as grown for its sugar yield
alone which is now a very definite
and highly valuable contribution to
the needs of America and her allies
for the period of the war. From the
standpoint of good farming, however,
the by-products of the industry are OF
greater Importance to a sugar beet
\growing district than is the sugar IT
Sslf These by-products which are OF
chief value to the livestock man are
the beet pulp, the molasses and the
sugar beet tops.
Sugar Beet Pulp
Sugar beet pulp is a highly val
liable succulent feed used in fatten-
ing beef cattle and sheep and has been
found. when properly handled, to be
of value in milk production. PUP,
when given ample time to go through
the SLIDING process, furnishes quite
cheaply a large portion of the bulky
livestock ration is succulent, and, IN
fulfilling that function in the ration,
carries. with it much of value that the
chemist does not find upon analysis.
II serves one of the fundamental
needs Of the livestock feeder by
cheapening the ration and increasing
the net profits Higher appreciation
is had. year by year, of the value OF
sugar beet pulp in animal feeding and
unuuestionably further use can he
made in the many fields of livestock
husbandry as compared with the
practice in the past.
MOlasses
The molasses may be utilized II
many ways in animal feeding. Allai-
ia hay. straw and other roughages
when given a molasses coaung are
+ rendered more palatable and the mo-
lasses may be fed with concentrates
to steers and other cattle and gives
excellent returns in comparison with
its cost.
Beet Top Silage
Another highly valuable product OF
the sugar beet growing industry Is
the beet top. The writer has seer
: hundreds of acres of tops In various
Meet growing districts handled In the
usual careless way and thereby
large part of the real feeding valne
lost. In a climate that can be de-
pended upon for large NUMBER O.
dry DAYS In fall, the tops give ex
cellent returns when piled up anc
left for the use of cattle and sheep
The new plan with the beet top, now
ever is one that results In little 1
any waste and is much more econom
ical than the plan of past years an'
results In a product that is more
highly relished than as compared
with the raw tops as they come from
the beet.
The Pit Sil0
A trench is dug four or five fee
deep. twenty to thirty feet wide ant
long enough to take care of the en-
tire crop of sugar beet tops. TIT
tops are hauled and spread In a pi
of this kind, making solid mass
tops, or mass made up of alternate
layers of tops and straw.
Beet Top Silage Value
n This pit, therefore, is the silo ant
its contents go through SLIDING pro
cess which results in highly palat