Effect of Sowing Date and Storage Period in Field on the Qualitative Characteristics of Two Sugar Beet Varieties

Abstract

The present study was conducted in split-split plot design with four replicates, at the Agricultural Research Center of Al Ghab, General Commission for Scientific Agricultural Research (GCSAR), Syria, during 2014/2015, and 2015/2016 growing seasons. The objective was to evaluate the effect of sowing dates, and length of storage on the processing characteristics.  Tow sowing dates were settled, (15^th of October, and January). The second factor was the storage durations of 6 days, and two varieties, one of them was monogerm (Vico), while the other was multigerm (Reda).

The results of analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed significant effects of sowing date on sucrose %, reverse sugars, and N content. The increment in sucrose percentage were 5.32%, 31.77%, while the increment in reverse sugars were 59.39%, 68.09%, but the increase in N content were 0.98%, 4.20% for autumn and winter sowing respectively. The deterioration was higher in wintertime as compared to autumn date. Reda showed better processing characteristics than Vico, but the differences were not significant for sucrose%, and N content.

Results showed that prolonging storage period of the harvested beet roots lead to high and gradually increment in the processing traits, from the first day to the last day of the studied storage period, with different percentages, indicating a clear deterioration in beet roots. Besides, the percentage of variance confirmed that the most effective factor for all studied traits was the sowing date, followed by the storage period, according to the table of variance analysis. It can be concluded the suitability of autumn date to grow sugar beet, taking into consideration the storage conditions after harvest, using multigerm varieties, to reduce the deterioration in processing characteristic of beet roots after harvest.