Beltwide Shorts

• First 40 Days: A couple of presentations were made relating to The First 40 Days: The Most Critical Period in Cotton Production, a white paper citing best management practices during the early season. The project was funded by Bayer CropScience and was based on input and data from a couple of dozen Extension workers and university personnel from a wide range of disciplines. We posted a PDF copy of the 8-page report on our web site. Click here to download the document.

• Cotton Record Keeping Advances: Cotton Incorporated unveiled an integrated accounting and field records system developed with cotton farmers in mind. Unlike software written mainly for the Corn Belt, this one includes things like expense categories for defoliation and ginning costs, and it all ties into a precision ag approach. The package was jointly developed Red Wing Software, Inc., and MapShots, Inc. with recommendations and encouragement from CI. The basic software package allows a producer to track variable rate applications, as well as conventional "whole field" applications. An optional software module that performs precision ag analysis and generates variable rate prescriptions. The precision ag module also includes soil test software that supports over 20 different lab "soil test" formats. Redwing will allow producers to know their true cost of production, and it will also help with tax information.