SILVER BEET.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3180, 28 March 1911, Page 2

SILVER BEET.

A NEW FORAGE PLANT.

REMARKABLE CAPABILITIES. At the Levin Horticultural. Society s Autumn Show a plant that _ attracted considerable interest and curiosity was a new variety of silver beet, which had been first brought under official notice by Mr 13. H. Just, fruitgrower, of Palmerston. This is not a beet in the ordinary sense of the term, nor does it even belong to the beet family. It is claimed for the silver beet that it will yield more vegetable stuff than any other similar plant- in the world. It is believed that it will run three years without re-sowing, provided the seed stems are cut off, tans preventing the plant freon going to seed. The plant on exhibition at the show was in its second year, and Mr Taylor, orchard superintendent at the Experimental Farm, lias great hopes of it being all that it has been represented' to be. Besides being a splendid fodder plant, it is a most wholesome vegetable for human consumption, both the stalk and the leaves being capable of being cooked to perfection. The root is not edible. According to Mr Taylor, it is going to be a most important plant. It is now being tried on the State Experimental Farms in the South Island. Mr Just’s plants were four feet ihigli, and said Mr Taylor: "You can cut and come again.’' As a vegetable the leaf can he used! as spinach, and the stalk cooked as celery. It is an all-round succulent, palatable vegetable., which is appreciated by the most fastidious. It is not attacked by any known pest, except, of course, slugs. The ordinary posts, cabbage flv, etc., only attack the cruciform family, and silver beet does not belong to that family. The seed has been in great demand, and the Government, we underr stand, purchased all that Mr Just could produce. Mr McPherson is also giving it a' trial down South, after hearing Mr Taylor’s opinion with regard to its capabilities. "I don’t know of a more

delicious vegetable,” said Mr Taylor, “and the most’exacting epicure would not find fault with it if it is properly cooked. We have to thank Mr Just, of Palmerston, for bringing it under our notice. I am also informed that fowls relish it, and, all round, it is the best plant of its species I have yet come across. I venture to say that it will be in universal demand before long, as all who have tried it speak highly of it.”