EVIDENCE FOR THE ESSENTIALITY OF SILICON FOR GROWTH OF THE BEET PLANT

Abstract

Plants of the Detroit Dark Red var. of the table beet made poor growth in culture solns. of low conc. in asphalt-painted iron containers supplied with pin-punctured rubber tube aerators. When 8.3 to 19 p.p.m. of Si or K2SiO3 was added to the solns. the fresh weight of plants of various sizes at the time of experimentation was increased 3 to 10 times as compared with the checks.