Beets Growing Well

In spite of yo-yo weather that keeps us guessing at tomorrow’s temperatures, sugarbeets have grown well in the past month, and Russ Fullmer, Sidney Sugars agriculture manager, expects this year’s crop will do better than last year’s. “Beets are growing pretty well,” he remarks. “They took off in the warm weather, but they are a little dry. It’s been tough to keep up with the watering with all crops, but the shifts in temperatures haven’t hurt us.”

He adds, “A few fields last week got over an inch of rain, and a few got some hail. One field had 30% defoliation but it won’t hurt the crop at this stage.”

Growers have not had to deal with any disease or insect pests but with the heat expected to arrive in earnest, agriculturists will set out the hobo units this week to check for conditions that are conducive to disease. “These units measure temperature and humidity and give us a good indication when Cercospora might start showing up,” Fullmer says. “We’ve had some perfect weather for Cercospora, but we haven’t seen any yet. It still is a little early, however.”

Fullmer rates summer of 2012 as an average year for sugarbeets. “At this point we are looking at an average year, although we will do a little better this year than last year in tonnage,” he comments.“We just have such a wide variance on stands. Some fields had enough moisture to start, while others did not.”

He continues, “The thing that killed us were those sprinkles of rain early in the spring which gave us a false sense of security and made us think the beets were OK. A little bit of moisture is a terrible thing; beets sprouted but there wasn’t enough moisture to keep them going. We had to replant close to 4000 acres, which is a lot for us.”

The new agriculturist, Todd Erickson, started his duties in mid-June. Erickson has responsibilities for the Savage, Powder River, and Pleasant View areas.

Sidney Sugars will participate in the Eastern Agricultural Research Center field day, scheduled for Thursday, July 19. Fullmer will discuss the sugar beet crop, how it looks, and talk about sugarbeet varieties.