Warm weather no friend to ‘good’ harvest, which nears completion

It’s been a warm October, which most people have reveled in.

The people involved in this year’s sugar beet harvest are not among them. The warmer-than-normal conditions have forced them to “start early and quit early,” said Mark Bjornestad, Western Sugar’s senior agriculturalist.

High internal temperatures in the beets are counterproductive, Bjornestad explained, so work is starting at 4:30 a.m. and knocking off as the day warms up. It’s counterproductive to pile up the beets if they are too hot, he said.

“We try to take advantage of the cool hours during the night,” Bjornestad said.

He said the warm weather has been a complication that wasn’t needed. Temperatures have routinely topped the 70s this month, but the beet harvest workers haven’t been soaking in the sun.

“We’d rather be wearing coats,” Bjornestad said.

But this has been a solid harvest, according to the veteran field man. The sugar content in the beets will top 17 percent; it’s at 17.2 percent now. Fields are producing, on average, 28 tons per acre, right on the five-year average.

“It’s going to be a good year,” Bjornestad said. “It’s not a record crop, but it’s a good one.”

He said the harvest should wrap up very soon. It’s about 80 percent done; the statewide average for this time of year is 50 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Service.

“We should be really close to harvest being complete by Halloween,” he said. “It’s a little ahead.”

While the heat hasn’t done any favors for the sugar beet harvest, other crops are benefitting from the warm, dry conditions, according to the USDA report, with 6.4 days of last week deemed suitable for field work.

Subsoil moisture in Wyoming was at 74 percent adequate and 1 percent surplus, compared to 38 percent adequate and none deemed surplus at this time last year. The corn silage harvest was at 96 percent, in line with the 95 percent harvest at the same time last year.

Only 14 percent of grain corn had been harvested, compared with twice that percentage at the same stage in 2013. Dry beans also were slightly behind last year, with 70 percent harvested and 86 percent cut compared to 88 percent harvested and 99 percent cut a year ago.

Range and pasture conditions remain impressive, with 80 percent deemed good or excellent compared to 40 percent in 2013.