Mossman and Sugarcane
Mossman is a
sugar town. Although sugar is the reason
for Mossman’s existence, it is not the only thing that goes on here. It’s position on the main road to Mossman
Gorge makes it an important destination and travellers heading north up the
Bloomfield Track to the Daintree National Park and Cape York stop here to fill
up with food and provisions.
But sugar
dominates the landscape. The early
settlers had to take out enormous amounts of forest to create the rolling
fields of cane that now runs from the mountains to the sea. The earliest settlers have left their
mark. Dan Hart, maybe the earliest in
1877, was responsible for the seeds of the rain trees than line the road north
from Mossman by the church. Others
planted mango trees that now line the road to the Mossman Gorge – to the estate
then called Mungo Park.
Sugar is a very specialised
sub-tropical and tropical grass that originated in South Asia. In northern NSW the crop takes two years
growing to reach maturity but in Far North Queensland – from around Ingham well
up to Mossman - sugar is an annual crop. Early sugar varieties tended to last
around three years before they need to be grubbed out and replanted but modern
varieties can grow and be cut through five or more seasons. Replanting sugarcane is straightforward. 20mm sections of cane are dropped into furrows
– that’s it. The cane sprouts just like
any other grass and soon grows up to four metres high. The cutting season starts just after the cane
flowers, around late June and ends around late October, depending on the
weather – too much rain delays cutting.
Around 500,000 tonnes of cane is processed through the Mossman mill
annually although with new cane coming from as far away as the Atherton
tablelands in 2013 the total will be much more.
The mill, constructed in the late 1890s, but heavily modified since can
deal with around one million tonnes.
While the
cane grows it needs weeding, feeding and chemical control of fungal diseases
like Rust. Specially designed high
tractors can drive through the cane rows.
It’s a continual concern to ensure that runoff of fertilisers do not
impact too much on the Barrier Reef so farmers look to ways to minimise the
application of inorganic fertiliser.
Mill Mud, a by- product of the cane crushing process, is applied to new
fields prior to planting.
 |
| sugarcane in Mossman |
The cane then goes to the mill in
trucks or by the narrow guage cane railway.
This railway, first set up in 1887, used also to take passengers between
Mossman and Port Douglas but is now exclusively used for cane. The tracks are cleaned up every May and long
trains of many wheeled bins get to the mill through what used to be the main
street in Mossman – Mill Street. The
loaded wagons make a great photo and the trains often stop traffic during the
cutting season as they have priority over road traffic.
The cane
crushing process starts as the trucks or trains wagons discharge the cut cane
into hoppers in the ground which take the cane to be washed (producing the mill
mud) and then in the crusher. The resulting juice is then boiled in enormous
vats and eventually turned into low-GI white sugar, molasses and other sugar
by-product. The liquid products
generally go by road to Bundaberg on the south east Queensland coast to be
refined or made into rum. The plant
waste, baggasse, has use in animal feed and mulch.
Cane fires
were once a regular, and spectacular occurrence. Until machinery was used to cut the cane the
job was done by hand. Hot dirty and
dangerous too. To minimise the transfer
of disease through rate droppings and to improve the sugar content of the cane
it was fired just before harvest. Today
cane is still fired but more rarely, although the fields are sometimes fired to
return the cane stumps to the soil as potash. The fire is quickly over but the noise of it like an express train. Very spectacular!
 |
| cane fire from Papillon |
No comments:
Post a Comment