Roots and tubers

= produces of fields – they provide products with low dry matter content (10 – 30 %) → it influences cultivation processes, harvests, post-harvest treatment, and storages with their morphological and biological qualities together

• They are very productive crops, they are able to provide higher production yields than other crops
• They are usually makers of energy matter (carbohydrates), they store them as storage matters at pulpy plant organs (stalks, stools, and roots)
• They are improving products in rotation of crops, manures are used for them, they leave the soil in good state
• First they grow slowly, they have wide leave cover  Þ they have special requirements for cropping, they have to be placed on an even keel and they require intensive treatment (inter-row soil processing during the vegetation) from planting or arising to full growth connection. It was done by hand earlier.
• Because of low dry matter content Þ they are easy damaged by mechanization during the harvest and post-harvest manipulation Þ they are susceptible to infections, diseases, and decay
• Storage – they are stored in special buildings (potato houses, cellars) or we use the clamping because they are sensitive to frost temperatures but they germinate with higher temperatures. It is possible to preserve them by drying, we can ensilage some of them.

Content of nutrients

• High carbohydrate content – sugar, starch, inulin
• Low nitrogenous matter content – mainly not albuminious (nitrates)
• Low fibrous material and lipid content
• Low macronutrient and micronutrient content (only excess of potassium)

Meaning

Root and tubers are used for straight nutrition (potatoes) or various products are made from them (sugar, treated potato products, starch, dextrins, coffee substitutes – chicory, etc.). There the methods for some tubers are elaborated presently (sugar beet – alcohol-petrol mixtures, etc.). Roots and tubers are used for livestock feeds, they are used directly, are ensiled, are smoked, are dried eventually. There the residues after industrial processes are utilized at livestock production (crushes, chippings, molasses, etc.) Roots and tubers have major meaning at farming system on the soil.

Roots and Tubers

• Fodder beet
• Sugar beet
• Salad beet
• Carrot
• Chicory
• Potato

• Sweet potato
• Topinambour
• Swede turnip
• Navew
• Kale
• Fodder turnip-cabbage
• Vegetable marrow
• Sugar melon
• Watermelon

Roots and tubers can be divided by various aspects, for example:

·        By the reproduction way:

• Generative

  • Beet, carrot, kale, fodder turnip-cabbage, marrow

  • They form store organs at the first year, after overwintering they form generative organs at the second year

• Vegetative

  • Potato, topinambour

  • The reproductive cycle takes one year, the generative reproduction is used for breeding

·        By the useful parts of grown crops:

• Root (beet, chicory, carrot, navew, kale, fodder turnip-cabbage)

• Tuber (potato, topinambour)

• Marrow (vegetable marrow, melon)

·        By the object of consumption:

• Table (potato)

• Industrial (sugar beet, chicory, potato)

• Fodder (the others)