Company Heritage
Families like to know their roots and understand their heritage. A family’s heritage is a result of its past. Businesses are the same way. Here is the story of the liquid feed industry itself.
The earliest documented reports of feeding molasses to cattle in North America are from 1890. It was used to eliminate dust and feed waste, in addition to providing a major source of energy. Due to it’s proximity to production, Mr. Ralph Kidder of the Everglades Experiment Station located in Belle Glade, Florida, could have potentially initiated some of the earliest research with cane molasses in 1936. It did not take U.S. Sugar very long to become involved; in 1940 it planted 80 acres in permanent grasses, put cattle on the pastures and fed molasses as a supplement. A 1941 publication of the Florida State Chamber of Commerce, "Florida’s Molasses-Fed Beef Equals the Nations Best," reviewed the excellent eating qualities of molasses fed beef and touted U.S. Sugar as providing impetus to Florida's growing cattle industry. In 1942, University of Florida's Dr. Gordon Kirk, Range Cattle Experiment Station in Ona, commenced the first research to determine the value of cane molasses as a supplement for brood cows on pasture.
Elsewhere in the country, several years went by with little academic attention to molasses until basic ruminant research was conducted in Missouri in the early 1950s. The North American liquid feed industry’s birth is thought to have occurred in the mid-1950s in Idaho and Nebraska, conceived by two brothers-in-law using beet molasses as the base ingredient. Also, Purdue University’s Dr. T. Wayne Perry published his famous "32% Liquid Supplement Formulations" that clearly helped launch the liquid feed industry.
Back in Florida, U.S. Sugar and the University of Florida, working at times separately and together, were making things happen in the growth of both the cattle and liquid feed industries. The University of Florida is the undisputed academic leader in the research of feeding cane molasses to ruminant animals. Notable names over the years include Baker, Chapman, Davis, Cunha, Hentges, Crockett, Pate, Moore, Kunkle, Brown, Hall, Arthington and others.
U.S. Sugar may have actually started its world famous cattle business, Sugarland Ranch, as a demonstration project to show skeptical cattlemen that cane molasses could be successfully fed to pasture cattle. Every "retired company old-timer" interviewed, credited Mr. Sid Crochet as the initiator of both the Cattle Project and the beginning of what has become the Suga-Lik® business. Crochet was responsible for the sale of molasses, largely sold to industrial distillers. He was convinced that using molasses as a cattle supplement would create more value for both Gulf region cattlemen and the Company. The Cattle Project began as a molasses feeding demonstration.
By 1946, Sugarland Ranch encompassed 5,000 acres and was demonstrating the feeding of heavy cane molasses free choice. Eventually, Sugarland Ranch became one of the largest commercial ranching operations in the world. By the time the land gave way to the southern migration of the citrus industry, the Cattle Project had emphatically demonstrated, on a practical basis, the value of using blackstrap cane molasses as the basic ingredient in supplements for Gulf region beef cattle. Crochet was right.
As the Company's sugar cane production increased, there was more molasses available and it began to work with cattlemen on their individual feed needs. During these years, various ingredients were incorporated to provide certain nutrients and feed additives. U.S. Sugar's first commercial feed plant opened in approximately 1961. Prior to that, ingredients were added and mixed by hand. Formulations also evolved. In the early years, as today, urea was used for added crude protein and phosphoric acid for a highly bioavailable phosphorus source. Bill Gober and John Black were hired in 1961 and 1962, respectively, to help further develop the liquid feed program. U.S. Sugar worked in conjunction with Hoffman-LaRoche to develop a dispersable vitamin. Then, water-soluble trace minerals were incorporated. Phenothiazine was an efficacious feed-through parasiticide that was eventually discontinued nationwide for environmental reasons. Fats and oils were researched and incorporated. The slurry concept was developed from an idea seen on a commercial cattle ranch.
In 1971 the brand name "Suga-Lik" was chosen in a brainstorming session among Gober, Black and Bob Hare. The name was officially trademarked in 1983. As that generation wound down their careers, they continued to develop and refine the business and a new feed plant was constructed and opened in 1993.
Today, the liquid feed industry continues to be a growth industry in North America. U.S. Sugar’s current generation is endeavoring to continue the tradition of excellence that preceded. The strong commitment to cattlemen's needs still exists, manifested through annual support worth tens of thousands of dollars to the University of Florida's Animal Science Research Program, as well as on-ranch development activities. There is continued investment in the Clewiston feed plant, enabling the production of innovative new products.
The plant continues to maintain the strict requirements for Feed Facility Certification. This program assures cattlemen and packers that no prohibited animal protein products are used in the facility. In recent years, the Company has developed supplementation strategies and built a Florida forage database that is unequaled anywhere.
The Suga-Lik® product line is now Fully Fortified™, meaning your Florida forage is supplemented with one of U.S. Sugar's Fully Fortified™ Suga-Lik® supplements and provides at least 100% of all the essential nutrients your cows require. There is no need to supplement anything else! No other commodity or commercial supplement product can legitimately make this claim. That is value delivered to you.
– As published in The Florida Cattleman & Livestock Journal, December 2002
