HARVEST

Success is SweeŁ

Valley-grown sugarcane crop yields ongoing profits

STORY AND PHOTOS BY DENISE CATHEY

It’s just before 8 a.m. with the sun still low in the sky as Matt Klosterman, president and general manager of Rio Farms Inc., leads me to a sugarcane field in Monte Alto behind the farm’s headquarters.

Using a cane machete, he hacks away at the base of a sugarcane stalk. He’s forgotten his pocketknife, so he carefully wields the machete to cut away the outer skin of a node to get to the plant’s fibrous center and gives me a wedge to try.

It’s just July, so the crop isn’t at its full October sweetness, but in my mouth, the earthy, fibrous sliver of cane already has a faint flavor like that of agave syrup.

This hint of sweetness is the unique taste of a crop only found within the state of Texas in the Rio Grande Valley.

For its growers, it represents a year of blood, sweat, tears and use of the most precious resource of all in the Valley — water. If they get it right, the return is worth it.

As a grower, Rio Farms is one of 100 that make up Rio Grande Valley Sugar Growers Inc., a member-owned co-operative that spans three counties committed to growing sugarcane in the region.

Over the next few weeks, as harvesting operations kick off through October and November, about 32,000 acres of sugarcane will be harvested, milled into raw sugar and shipped on a barge by the co-op from the Port of Harlingen to the Domino Sugar Chalmette Refinery in Chalmette, La.

Matt Klosterman, president and general manager of Rio Farms Inc., stands by one of the farm’s sugarcane fields in Monte Alto.

In 1970, starting with just 100 growers, Rio Grande Valley Sugar Growers Inc., decided to bring sugarcane back and built what is now the oldest and only sugar mill in the state.

A Look Back

Sugar is big business here in the Valley, but it’s had its ups and downs over the years.

According to the co-operative, sugarcane was introduced to South Texas in the 1800s and by the early 1900s it was being produced commercially. By 1913 five sugar mills were operating in the Valley. However, blight, low prices and a pivot by growers to other sugar-producing crops statewide lessened the financial incentive to be had with sugarcane. The last of these mills closed in 1921.

However, sugar wasn’t gone forever.

In the 1960s the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station in Weslaco and the U.S. Department of Agriculture collaborated with local agricultural leaders of South Texas to conduct feasibility studies, which found that sugarcane could be cost effective again to grow.

In 1970, starting with just 100 growers, Rio Grande Valley Sugar Growers Inc., decided to bring sugarcane back and built what is now the oldest and only sugar mill in the state.

During the 2021-2022 season, this collaborative produced 127,252 tons of raw sugar and 43,630 tons of feed-grade molasses, all from Valley-grown sugarcane.

From Cane to Sugar

Every field of sugarcane starts with a cutting.

The most popular variety of sugarcane grown in the Rio Grande Valley is CP 89-2143, an older variety out of Florida that growers have used in the area for the past decade.

As for Rio Farms, this year it is devoting 2,700 acres of its 18,000acre spread in Hidalgo, Willacy and Cameron Counties to growing sugarcane.

Once a grower decides to put sugarcane in the ground, it is a commitment. “The sugarcane growing process is different from any other crop in that it is a year-long crop so it takes a year to grow fully,” Klosterman said.

Sugarcane is a type of perennial grass, which means that once planted, farmers can get years of crops before they need to replant it.

An experienced sugarcane grower, Klosterman explains that with a good crop, you can

Top Left: Sugarcane harvest in Santa Rosa. Top Right: Cane machete being used to cut a sliver of sugarcane. Midpage: Smoke rising from freshly burned field in Harlingen. Opposite page: In Santa Rosa, a bulldozer loads a truck with raw sugar for transportation to the Port of Harlingen.

expect to get five to 10 years from one planting before you need to rotate in something else. The average, though, is about three years.

Another difference between sugarcane and other crops grown throughout the Valley is the amount of water required. Whereas cotton and corn each need two or three waterings over the season, sugarcane requires significantly more — 30 to 60 inches of rainfall — as it grows for a longer period. Because the Valley doesn’t get that much rainfall, irrigation is needed to supplement it.

Once through the hottest months of summer, a crucial time for the crop’s growth and water needs, the cane is ready to harvest starting in October or November.

Since the crop is annual, farmers know when to harvest each year, but Klosterman says there’s another way to determine this: Brix scale refractory testing. It measures the level of sucrose in the cane’s juice, an indicator of when the crop is sufficiently sweet and, thus, ready for pulling.

Growers get paid for their sugarcane by the tonnage and the sugar quality in its juice. So a large crop with a high percentage of sucrose in it makes for a good season.

As for how the co-operative did collectively this previous season, Klosterman explains, “In general, the crop was a little bit light, but it had a higher sugar ratio within that biomass. We also got a boost from a higher price for sugar,” he said. He expects that this year’s harvest might have similar qualities.

Once harvest season officially kicks off, it takes months to work through all of the cooperative’s 32,000 acres, with crews working 24/7.

Harvesting starts with fire.

“The reason that we burn sugarcane fields is to burn the leaf off the stalk. We aren’t burning the stalk itself,” said Dale Kerstetter, the environmental and safety director of Rio Grande Valley Sugar Growers.

They do this because stalks with the leaves on slow processing at the mill as more filtration is needed.

If harvesters can’t burn the stalks, they can still harvest the cane, a process known as “cutting green.”

Once harvested, the cane is weighed and taken to the mill in Santa Rosa to have the juice pressed out of it and turned into raw sugar.

Then the sugar is transported to Chalmette, before ending up back in the Valley on our pantry shelves under the Domino Sugar label.

Denise Cathey is a reporter and photojournalist living in Brownsville, Texas. A native Texan, she has an ingrained love of whiskey, BBQ and the truly odd. She’s currently on a quest for the perfect cup of coffee. Follow her on Instagram @denisecatheyphoto.

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