A week of rain slowed beet digging across northern Wyoming, but producers say they’ll keep factories fed as harvest ramps up — and the sugar looks stellar.
“We harvest enough beets to stay about three days ahead of the factory,” said Ric Rodriguez of the Western Sugar Cooperative near Lovell.
Mud is a hassle, he added, but the bigger trick this time of year is temperature: piles can slump in warm sun. Ideal conditions? “Cool and dry,” Rodriguez said, since some outdoor stacks sit up to 90 days.
“We never want to run out of beets in the factory,” he added, noting the cost of stop-start operations.
He expected crews back in the fields “by tomorrow.”
Growing weather around Lovell has been kind since spring, but pricing is the wildcard amid talk of oversupply.
“The price is a little depressed,” Rodriguez said.
The co-op is still selling sugar from the 2024 harvest, which muddies forecasts. Last year’s beets fetched around $60/ton; the 2025 crop likely lands lower.
Even so, Western Sugar’s district projections are strong: 29.01 tons per acre with 19.05% sugar — on pace for the second-highest sugar content ever. Last year set the record at 19.21% with 29.21 tons per acre.
Drought pinched fields around Wheatland.
“We’ve been such a heavy drought,” said former beet grower Josh Kaufman.
“Our water ran out around the 20th to 25th of July,” leaving some acres light unless growers had wells.
In Worland, Wyoming Sugar Company is already slicing.
“We started pre-pile Sept. 17 and slicing Sept. 18,” said president/CEO Mike Greear.
Early numbers from 13,200 contracted acres are “on par” with last year’s record: sugar tested 18.5% — higher than the usual September 17% — with companywide yields projected around 34 tons per acre. Wyoming Sugar finished at 19.6% sugar content last year; Greear says they’re “well on our way” again.
Beet sugar doesn’t just stock the pantry. A sliver goes into pharmaceuticals, Greear said. It also fuels craft spirits (some distilleries even bottle beet-based vodka and “rum”), and becomes isomalt, a beet-derived low-calorie sweetener popular in hard candies. Still, Greear is blunt:
“There’s no substitute for sugar — use it in moderation and stay active.”
As Rodriguez notes, more than half of US sugar comes from beets, and once refined, it’s “just pure white sugar” — chemically the same as cane. If the weather cooperates and markets stabilize, Wyoming growers look poised to deliver another sweet campaign.
The original story by David Madison for Cowboy State Daily.
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