Snowstorm slows beet harvest
By Scott Kraus, Ag Weekly correspondent
Monday, October 20, 2008 5:13 PM CDT
TWIN FALLS, Idaho - A snowstorm over the weekend of Oct. 10 through 12 slowed the sugar beet harvest in Idaho just as it was getting under way, said an official of Amalgamated Sugar Co. in Boise.
“It took three, four, five days of harvest from us,” said John Schorr, corporate director of agriculture for the grower-owned cooperative, which includes all Idaho beet growers.
The main part of the harvest had started on Oct. 6 in the Magic Valley.
“They were really just starting to get rolling,” Schorr said.
And it takes time for the snow to melt and dissipate from the soil. The Declo area in south-central Idaho on Oct. 15 still has several inches of snow on some fields, he said.
In western Idaho, the harvest was due to start about a week later than in the Magic Valley. Western Idaho was less affected by the snow. And harvest started on Oct. 13, he said.
“How the harvest is going, it depends on where you’re at,” Schorr said.
Meanwhile, it’s early yet to know the yield and sugar content of the beets. He said he expects probably an average yield. And that’s after poor spring weather slowed planting and destroyed about 17,000 acres of beets.
He said the new Roundup Ready beets, which the co-op is using commercially for the first time this year, should help. The genetically enhanced beet, whose sugar is identical to sugar from conventional beets, allows the use of the herbicide Roundup. It’s more effective and less costly overall than existing weed-control chemicals for conventional beets.
He said that’s already visible in the reduced number of weeds during harvest. Farmers face fewer problems with weeds plugging their equipment due to the new beets.
“They’ve done very well,” he said. “You don’t have the weed pressure.”
And hopefully clear skies are in store for the rest of the harvest of about 123,000 acres, according to Mark Duffin, executive director of the Idaho Sugar Beet Growers Association in Boise.
“It’s still early,” he said. “We’re just getting started. Hopefully the weather will be good.”
So far, the beet harvest is behind average, reports the Boise office of the National Agricultural Statistics Service. On Oct. 14, it reported that the beet harvest statewide was about 12 percent done. That compares to 26 percent last year and a five-year average of 23 percent.
Duffin said it’s not unusual to get snowstorms in October.
“But this was more than normal in some areas,” he said.
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