OSLO, Minn. - It's been smooth sailing so far for the 2007 sugar beet pre-pile harvest, says an American Crystal Sugar spokesman.
But as harvest kicks into high gear, things may not be quite as smooth in the northern Red River Valley.
A bridge, which crosses the Red River near the company's Drayton, N.D., processing plant, was closed Aug. 21 after a state-ordered inspection revealed cracks in the steel beams underneath it. The inspection was spurred by the recent collapse of the Interstate 35 bridge in Minneapolis.
"This is going to create havoc with the beet harvest starting," says Bev Jensen, former mayor of Drayton. "Farmers are going to be putting up a big howl on this. It's major harvest time. This bridge is vital."
The closing will force drivers to divert to another river bridge, either 17 miles north to North Dakota Highway 5 near Joliette, N.D., or 11 miles south to North Dakota Highway 17.
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The closure was expected to be for only one week, "the bridge being out is definitely going to be a hindrance to our drivers," American Crystal spokesman Jeff Schweitzer says, "but we absolutely want to transport our beets in a safe fashion."
Schweitzer says he is encouraged by the pre-pile numbers so far.
"The beets we are seeing are in the high teens, as far a tons go," he says. "We're estimating harvesting an average of 23 tons per acre. The total acres, assuming we'll harvest them all, is 490,000 acres. In pre-piling harvest, we'll harvest 10 (percent) to 14 percent of the total, but we don't yet know exactly how large this crop is going to be."
The harvest began at the Alvarado, Midway and Comstock-Wolverton pre-pile sites in Minnesota. As of the morning of Aug. 22, 80,000 tons of sugar beets had been piled at the three sites.
The 2007 pre-pile harvest start date is roughly the same as last year's.
"We started just a day earlier than last year," Schweitzer says. "We had to look at our crop from an overall perspective, and it appears we have an above-average crop."
Schweitzer says the four southern-most American Crystal factories - Moorhead, East Grand Forks and Crookston in Minnesota and Hillsboro, N.D. -- are operating for pre-pile harvest.
"We got them running and are getting their operations smoothed out. We've also started production of sugar," he says.
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American Crystal has set Sept. 29 as the start date for the beginning of the full stockpile harvest, but for the time being, Schweitzer is content with the progress made so far in the 2007 campaign.
"We're still in the early stages, but we've had good lifting and receiving and opening of our piling sites and factory locations."
