Better Beet Seed.
         Better Revenue.

By: Brad Devereaux, [L=http://lovellchronicle.com/[The Lovell Chronicle[EL]

With the start of the sugar beet harvest about a week away, farmers are readying their crop and employees of the Western Sugar Factory in Lovell are finishing up maintenance projects and preparing for campaign.
2009 is shaping up to be a great year for sugar in the Lovell area, according to Western Sugar Senior Agriculturalist Mark Bjornsted.
“This will be a record crop if samples hold true,” Bjornsted said, adding it could be “the best crop ever harvested in Lovell.”
Samples taken Aug. 25 from farms in the Lovell area indicated an average of 24 tons per acre, averaging 14.2 percent sugar. Bjornsted said the beets will probably increase by 2 or 3 tons per acre and percentage of sugar could rise as much as 3.5 percent before harvest time late next week. This could put yields at up to 27 tons per acre and beets packed with up to 17.7 percent sugar.
Harvest will start early this year on Friday, Sept. 18, Bjornsted said, because of the large harvest. The factory campaign is scheduled to start on Sept. 20. Campaign is being started early because tonnage is high enough and so that beets can be stacked in piles at a good time for storage, Bjornsted said.
While the growing season started off slow with some cooler temperatures, it was a good year overall for sugar beets with good weather and not much disease, Bjornsted said. The cool weather, which has taken a toll on some other crops, doesn’t affect the beets much, he said.
This will be the first full campaign for Lovell Western Sugar Plant Manager Phil Hackman, who began his current position about one month into last year’s campaign. Last year’s campaign went well and Hackman said he is planning on another good year at the factory.
“We’re pretty excited about the size of the crop and what it will mean to Lovell,” Hackman said. “It should be a record year.”
Hackman said maintenance crews are in the process of finishing all the work that was done during summer shutdown at the factory.
Projects completed or nearly completed include work on the diffuser, replacing the bottom of an evaporator and warehouse roof repair. As part of a Western-Sugar-wide initiative, the factory performed extra maintenance on slicers and centrifugals, Hackman said, aimed at keeping the factory running smoothly and avoiding breakdowns. He said the recommendations in the initiative are based on the preferred maintenance methods of many world-class manufacturing organizations. The initiative also includes training and improving the organization and the standardization of jobs across shifts and across factories, Hackman said.
Hackman said the campaign will be done on or around Feb. 10, 2010. If beets are stored after mid-February, storage conditions could change and decrease the amount of sugar extracted from the beets, he said.
29,700 acres of sugar beets were forecasted planted in WY this year, according to the United States Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistic Service. In the U.S., 1,172,900 acres were planted.
During last season’s harvest, 27,100,000 acres were harvested in Wyoming. For this season, the USDA NASS estimates 28,700,000 acres will be harvested.