Many sugar beet fields in northern Wyoming sustained more severe damage from an early frost than first thought.

Western Sugar Cooperative officials and members of the Big Horn Basin Beet Growers Association made the assessment after touring fields across the Lovell factory district late last week.

The early October freeze occurred just as farmers began to harvest what was expected to be a record sugar beet crop.

Many of the beets remaining in the ground are so badly damaged that the co-op decided to stop harvesting for now.