The article draws on labour and migration histories of the early twentieth century to demonstrate how migrants’ land use was modified in the process of moving from rural Catalonia to northern Queensland. Once in Australia, migrants were able to use sharecropping practices to negotiate Anglo-Saxon expectations of assimilation associated with cane farming. Using a detailed case study, the article demonstrates the interconnected systems of migration and agriculture in Catalonia and Queensland. These cultural practices came under increasing pressure in the mid-1920s, as cane farms expanded beyond the scope of a single family to own and farm their own land. The article contributes to scholarship regarding the racialisation of Mediterranean migrants. It also demonstrates the limits of ethno-centric histories to understand the cultural diversity and economic interests that characterised Queensland’s northern cane fields.