Oakes
SUGAR BEET VARIETY PERFORMANCE TRIAL
W. Albus, L. Besemann and
H. Eslinger
Table 1. Results of the
sugar beet variety performance trial.
Although sugarbeets are primarily a dryland crop in the Red
River Valley several thousand acres are irrigated in eastern ND and western
Minnesota. About another 15,000 acres
are grown under irrigation in northwestern ND.
Top producing varieties under dryland production may or may not be the
best varieties under irrigation. As
quality is very important in the processing of sugarbeets it becomes important
to test these parameters in an irrigated environment. The objective of this trial was to evaluate irrigated sugar beets
for yield and quality characteristics.
We would like to thank American Crystal Sugar Company for their
support. A special thanks goes to Dr.
Allan Cattanach, agronomist with American Crystal for his advice in growing the
crop. We would also like to thank the
NDSU sugarbeet crew for their help during harvest.
|
Soil: |
Embden loam and Gardena loam;
pH=6.8; 2.5% organic matter; soil-P and soil-K was very high; soil-S was
high. |
|
Previous crop: |
2006 – cabbage and soybean;
2005 – cabbage; 2004 – field corn. |
|
Seedbed Preparation: |
Disk and multiweed (field
cultivate) on April 25. |
|
Planting: |
Planted on April 26 in 22-inch rows
at 120,000 seeds per acre and were later thinned to 47,500 plants per acre. |
|
Plots: |
Plots were 17 ft long by
7⅓ ft (4 rows) wide. There were
four reps. |
|
Fertilizer: |
November 2006, broadcast 9 lbs N/acre, 43 lbs P2O5/acre,
101 lbs K2O/acre and 13.5 lbs S/acre as 11-52-0, 0-0-60 and
90% elemental sulfur. Apply 30 lbs N/acre on June 6 and 90 lbs
N/acre on June 19 as 32-0-0. |
|
Irrigation: |
Overhead sprinkler irrigation
as needed. |
|
Pest control: |
Weeds were controlled with Nortron
(4 oz/acre) + Progress (6 oz/acre) on May 9, Select 2E (8 oz/acre) + NIS
(0.05% v/v) on June 5), rototilling and by hand weeding. For disease control; Eminent (13 oz/acre)
on July 11 and August 3, Proline (5 oz/acre) on July 21, and Headline (12 oz/acre)
on August 16 and August 31. |
|
Harvest: |
Harvested on October 22. Harvest area was 17 feet of the center two
rows. The beets were mechanically
topped and lifted and then hand picked counted and weighed. A sample from each plot was taken for
analysis. |
Stand establishment, as shown by final stands, ranged from
39,316 to 48,228 plants/acre. Yields
ranged from 36.4 to 43.8 ton/acre. Crystal
820 had the highest sugar % and highest recoverable sugar/ton (RST). The highest recoverable sugar/acre (RSA) was
recorded with SDX Alpine due to its higher overall yield Sugar percent was good and sugar lost to
molasses was low. Impurities in the
beets; sodium, potassium and amino-N were low.
Fall 2006 soil tests showed 27 lb/acre of nitrate-N at the 0-24’ depth
compared to 21 lb/acre in the fall 2007 soil test. Sugarbeets were grown with a 165 lb/acre of fertilizer plus soil
N in this sandy loam soil with an organic matter content of 2.5 %.
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performance trial
Table 1. Results of
the Oakes Irrigation Research Site 2007 sugar beet variety trial.
|
Variety |
Yield |
Sugar |
Sugar |
Recoverable |
Sodium |
Potassium |
Amino |
Stand |
||
|
loss |
Sugar |
Sugar |
||||||||
|
|
ton/acre |
----------- % ------------ |
lb/ton |
lb/acre |
---------------------- ppm -------------------- |
plants/acre |
||||
|
|
||||||||||
|
Crystal 434 |
40.3 |
17.8 |
1.3 |
329 |
13276 |
106 |
2012 |
432 |
45607 |
|
|
Crystal 727 |
36.4 |
18.6 |
1.2 |
349 |
12662 |
81 |
1908 |
377 |
39316 |
|
|
Crystal 820 |
38.7 |
18.6 |
1.0 |
353 |
13615 |
90 |
1743 |
286 |
39491 |
|
|
HH 317 |
39.2 |
17.8 |
1.0 |
336 |
13161 |
83 |
1749 |
312 |
41763 |
|
|
SDX Alpine |
43.8 |
17.1 |
1.2 |
318 |
13927 |
74 |
2022 |
345 |
48228 |
|
|
VDH 46519 |
43.2 |
17.2 |
1.1 |
322 |
13869 |
74 |
1921 |
283 |
42811 |
|
|
|
||||||||||
|
MEAN |
40.3 |
17.8 |
1.1 |
334 |
13418 |
84 |
1892 |
339 |
42869 |
|
|
C.V. (%) |
5.0 |
2 |
7.6 |
2 |
5 |
15 |
5 |
13 |
9 |
|
|
LSD (0.05) |
3.0 |
0.5 |
0.1 |
13 |
964 |
19 |
134 |
65 |
5624 |
|
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