Father-son growers Ralph and Jason Taylor of TNT Management Inc. in California’s Imperial Valley have set a new world record for extractable sugar per acre. Using Betaseed variety 5678 in a 130-acre field, the Taylors averaged 77.91 tons per acre with 17.15% sugar content. They achieved 22,604 pounds of extractable sugar per acre.

The family has a long history of raising sugarbeets. They farm over 10,000 acres. This includes 3,330 acres of sugarbeets, along with onions, alfalfa, wheat, bermudagrass, and sudangrass.

Jason Taylor noted that managing varying soil types and intense October heat posed challenges, but careful micromanagement and targeted spot treatments kept the sugarbeet crop healthy.

Baja Farms, also in the Imperial Valley, held the prior record in 2019. California is the sixth-largest sugarbeet producer in the U.S. behind Minnesota, Idaho and North Dakota.

Read more about the sugarbeet world record for extractable sugar per acre here.