MECHANICAL AND MANUAL SOWING AND HOEING PROCESSES IN RELATION TO CHEMICAL CONSTITUENTS AND YIELD COMPONENTS OF SUGAR BEET

This experiment was carried out in two suooessive seasons (2007-2008 and 2008-2009) at Saltha Agriculture Research Station, Kafr EI-Sheikh Governorate. To study the response of sugar beet yield and quality to the use of different planters compared to traditional sowing method in combination with different hoeing methods. The present work included fifteen treatments represent the combination between four planter machines compared to traditional planting method (manual) and three weed control methods I.e. manual hoeing, mechanical hoeing In addition to hoeing + post emergence herbicide (metamitron) Goiter. A split plot design In four replications was used. The main plot was devoted to planter machines treatments, meanwhile, the three weed control codices were randomly distributed In the sub plot. The obtained results showed that the types of planter had a significant increment on the yield in terms of root, top and sugar yield tonjfad. with the superiority of planter type M3. Also the root dimensions in terms of root length and diameter and root volume was statistically affected On the other hand the chemical constituent i.e. Impurities (Na, K and o-amino nitrogen %) and quality %was not affected by the type of planter compared to the manual sowing. Meanwhile, TSS 95 was significantly decreased under the manual sowing, where sucrose % was highly significant  at using planter type M3. Concerning the hoeing methods, the mechanical hoeing signifiantly surpassed the traditional hoeing and hoeing + goltfr. This result was true under all studied vegetative tharacteristts, chemical constituents and yield components.