Sugarcane Harvesting - Long Post

Last month we spent a couple of days in southern Louisiana. While there we took a little trip down to New Iberia to tour the Tabasco factory. We took some back roads and saw many, many acres of sugarcane. I stopped at Hi-Crop Equipment, the John Deere dealer there, and met some great people, Mitchell and Alison, in particular.

I'm curious about how sugarcane is harvested...we saw some machines off in the distance, but not close enough to get a good look. I've watched a couple of You-Tube videos on the subject, but how do the leaves get separated from the stems (if that's the proper term)? I assume that the stems get crushed at a mill and then the juice is processed into sugar.

Please educate me!! Thanks in advance

Stan

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xR2GAjHvuD4 If you watch the John deere 3510 sugercane harvester in this video it cuts the tops of the plants with the leaves off right in front of the cab with a top boom and drops them on the ground .But there is also trash going out the back of the machine.

Stan:

I'm in the heart of sugar-cane country. See the links below. Unclear to me is when mechanical harvesters took over --- I can't remember but I think it was in last 30 years. Before that harvest was pretty primitive and cane went to the mills as full stalks.

http://www.wbrz.com/videos/sugar-cane-harvesting-underway/


http://www.amscl.org/SugarMills.htm

kajun

I too am curious about Sugarcane harvesting. Twenty years ago I had an old migrant worker tell me they burned the field first then cut the cane and loaded by hand. He said it was a terrible job. I bet it was!

Years ago they use to burn the fields first; cut the cane in full stalks and let it lay next to the row; then come along with a backhoe and load the stalks into wagons behind a tractor; take it to a central loading area; dump it on the ground; and then take another backhoe and load it into tractor trailers.

Today they cut the cane green with the machine in the video. It takes in the whole plant; cuts the cane in pieces 6 to 12 inches long and runs it up a conveyor to a cart pulled next to the cutter. Fans blow across the cane to blow the lighter leaves out the back.
That cart the tractor is pulling can be parked next to a tractor trailer and the cart will lift in the air a dump the load off the side into the road trailer.

Sugar cane is planted and harvested 1 row at a time. They cut the cane in August and plant it into fields that have been fallow all summer long. The plant will be ready for harvest the next September to December. They get 3 harvest years off 1 planting around here. More in locations better suited for cane growing.

You can look around the lsu ag web site in the link and find out anything you want to know about growing sugarcane in La.
LSU ag center

John,

Thanks for the infomative reply. It's an interesting crop, for sure.

Stan

Sure glad I grew up somewhere besides that sugarcane area...that just sounds like a horrible job.

Stan

Thanks for the reply. The harvesting video was quite informative. I'll check out the other one later.

Stan

That's quite a machine!

Thanks for the reply.

Stan