Soybeans: if you want a rain, so do they

Alan Blaine, Mississippi Soybean Specialist, talks today in SoyFax about the need to water beans in May when conditions turn dry. Irrigating beans that early still goes against preconceived notions about managing the crop, he admits.

Blaine made a couple of comments that we did not include in today's report due to space limitations.

• "People sometimes say they don't want to water beans in May. If that's how you feel, then you should plant your soybeans in May, and that way you'll never have to water them in May. But, remember that all of our yield gains in Mississippi have been with beans planted early. We have never been able to achieve the yield levels we now have with May-planted soybeans."
• "Here's a good rule of thumb to go by when trying to decide whether to water beans this time of the year. If you're driving down the road and think to yourself, 'I sure wish it would rain,' then you can bet that your soybeans -- in their own way -- are thinking the same thing, and it's probably time to irrigate."

Rice: heavy rains hit Texas rice country but miss parched S. Louisiana

Parts of Texas rice country received overwhelming amounts of rain on Monday – up to 18 inches in seven hours just outside of Beaumont. But the heavy rains pretty much played out before they reaching southern Louisiana, which remains parched and in need of steady rains to eliminate salt contamination caused by Hurricane Rita last fall.

We’ll have more details in tonight’s RiceFax. Here’s a preliminary report:

West of El Campo, it rained five to six inches, with totals increasing to 10 to 12 inches in the Victoria area. Between Houston and the Louisiana line, the system dumped even more rain in places. Bayous and canals were already backing up this morning. David Mitchell with M&M Air Service in Beaumont, said that it rained nearly 15 inches at his home between about 1 a.m. and 4 a.m. Monday. Local canals and bayous were backing up today, he said, and the nearby Winnie municipal airport had water in some hangers. “One competitor said that fish and crawfish were swimming in his hanger this morning,” Mitchell reported.

Mitchell said that his immediate area probably received the most rainfall, and as you moved away in any direction the totals fell off to three to four inches.

Garry N. McCauley, acting Texas Extension Rice Specialist, said that the central counties in the state’s rice production area receive lesser amounts, from maybe a half-inch to 1.5 inches. Where it did rain, many levees were submerged. At least 35% of the crop is at PD and 5% -- mainly in Matagorda County – has started heading, he specified. “We’ll have to wait until all this water recedes before we know how much of a hit we took,” McCauley added.

To the east, growers in Louisiana were disappointed that at least some of the rain didn’t make it to them. Parts of south Louisiana have only had two months with normal or above-normal rainfall, and those were August and September of 2005 when hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the Gulf Coast.

“Since January 1, we’re at a 10-inch deficit for rainfall, and the deficit since April 2005 is something like 25 inches,” says Eddie Eskew, Jeff Davis Parish Extension Agent in Jennings, La. Eskew said it maybe rained a quarter of an inch at Jennings.

Howard Cormier, Vermilion Parish Extension Agent, Abbeville, La., said he measured three-quarters of an inch at his home, which is near the center of the pairsh. Vermilion’s rice acreage is down 60% from 2005, mainly due to salt-contaminated soil and surface water. Farmers planted just over 30,000 acres this year, but Cormier doesn’t expect all of that to make it to harvest. Without fresh water, some rice is now languishing without a flood.

”We need two to three inches of rain about every two weeks over a period of time to flush away the salt,” Cormier said. “Even with that, we’ve already lost future rice acreage. In some cases, growers who couldn’t grow rice this year have taken jobs in town or something else, and a lot of them probably won’t be back. We’ll continue to have rice here for years to come, but not like in the past.”

Cotton: Yes, the Beltwide will be in New Orleans

A couple of people, including a California crop consultant, have asked lately if I knew whether the Beltwide Cotton Conference will be in New Orleans next January as originally planned. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, it's a natural question to ask.

And the answer is, "yes." The Beltwide is returning to New Orleans.

T. Cotton Nelson, National Cotton Coucil communications director, confirmed a while back that NCC was sticking with its commitment, and he included the following info in his newsletter last week:

"The conferences' headquarters hotels - the New Orleans Marriott and Sheraton - are newly renovated and larger room blocks will allow more conferees to stay close to the action. As of May 2, more than 2,630 restaurants had reopened and the city, a perennial favorite among Beltwide conferees, has been declared healthy."

Based on Nelson's report, people had already been asking about safety and health issues relating to New Orleans. NCC put together an FAQ page covering the subject. Click here to go to it.

I asked Nelson at the last Beltwide -- in San Antonio in January -- if the NCC planned to go back to New Orleans in 2007. That far back (and barely four months after Katrina), Nelson said emphatically, "If any way possible. The (NCC) board believes it's the right thing to do. It's important to the city and Louisiana that we come back in '07."

Thank you, National Cotton Council.

I can almost taste the bread pudding at Mr. B's.

Mississippi cotton: mites being treated in south Delta

We began hearing scattered reports about spider mites in Mississippi cotton a couple of weeks ago. Angus Catchot, the state's Extension Entomologist, said today in the Mississippi Crop Situation newsletter that some fields have been treated.
"At this time it has been somewhat spotty, but I have been getting calls of more people finding mites each day with eggs present," Catchot wrote. "We are getting into a weather pattern of hot and dry, which is ideal for mite populations to increase rapidly."
Spider mites, once considered a minor and secondary pest, have been a more persistent problem in parts of the Midsouth over the last five years. Areas in northeast Arkansas and north Alabama have had persistent populations for longer than that. Shifts in insecticide usage and a decline in in-furrow insecticide use are cited by entomologists as a couple of possible factors. Drier conditions also tend to favor mite development, and some materials used to treat thrips tend to flare mites.
Click here to download Catchot's full report.

Georgia peanuts: thrips raise concern about TSWV

Thrips are on the increase in Georgia peanuts this spring, and that leads to concern about tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV), which is linked to thrips activity. The insects act as vectors, spreading the virus in young stands. They are particularly troubling in weak or uneven stands because relatively small numbers concentrate on the first plants up and heavily implant the virus.

One way to minimize thrips activity has been to follow the TSWV risk index, which lays out a set of guidelines. The more index points a grower follows, the lower his likely risk of seeing intense TSWV. A key element is later planting, and May 15 has been seen as an optimum date for starting. While earliness has been emphasized with every other field crop in the last 10 years, planting peanuts later became a logical part of a disease management program.

The idea is that peanuts planted in that period have a better likelihood of making a quick, even stand and diluting thrips pressure. There are other points to the index – planting on twin rows, for example, and using planting-time systemic insecticides – but of all the factors the index takes into account, the later planting date was at least a key element. A grower could do everything else right, but an early planting date still put him at great risk, research showed.

The later planting date has been a widely accepted idea, practiced by farmers as far west as central and south Texas. And with the exception of large-acreage growers who must start early, it’s hard to find many farmers in the lower Southeast who begin planting peanuts much before mid May.

Here’s the problem: TSWV rates dropped dramatically as more growers began following the index guidelines. But in 2004 TSWV pressure blipped up. It was worse in 2005, and so were thrips. Yield loss in Georgia to TSWV went from 1% in 2003 to 4% in 2004 to as much about 7% in 2005, based on Extension estimates.

This year’s influx of thrips in Georgia do not portend well for 2006 being a light TSWV season. John Beasley, Extension Peanut Specialist, said this week that it’s too early to say that heavy thrips activity will automatically lead to increased TSWV. But Beasley added that his “gut instinct” tells him it could be a season with problems. He and Extension Entomologist Steve Brown have been comparing notes, Beasley said, and their consensus is that 2006 is shaping up to be the worst thrips year since 1997.

Why are thrips worse?

That’s a question that Brown and other entomologists will be pondering well after harvest. The first assumption is that the weather has somehow triggered an upward population trend. In some areas wheat is coming off early, for example, due to warmer conditions in April, and maybe that flushed more thrips into outlying areas.

Consultants and Extension entomologists already are reporting heavier-than-normal pest pressure in other crops, like sweet corn, may indicate that this will be a challenging insect season, anyway. Thrips have been active in cotton, too, catching stands that were slowed down by adverse growing conditions.

See this weekend’s PeanutFax for more comments.

Drought persists in South and Southwest

Doane posted the following item on our content site (http://agfax2.com):

Drought persists in South and Southwest 5/25/2006 -- The U.S. experienced the warmest April on record, according to data from the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. The previous record for April was set in 1981. Dry conditions accompanied the warm weather across large portions of the South and Southwest. At the end of April, moderate-to-extreme drought affected 31 percent of the contiguous U.S., an increase of 5 percent from March. Nebraska's state climatologist said this week his state needs rain immediately. Al Dutcher says that the current U.S. Drought Monitor puts a good portion of eastern and north-central Nebraska out of drought, but these areas have not received significant spring moisture and are abnormally dry.

Click here to see the most recent drought monitor maps.

Soybean rust becomes factor in Mexican seed area

We've heard scattered reports about soybean rust in seed-production regions of Mexico. Syngenta sent the following advisory today:

Surprise ASR Hits Portions of Mexico

A sudden bout of Asian soybean rust has left more than 20 soybean seed growers near Tampico, Mexico, dealing with the disease. About 320 hectares, or 650 acres, were affected, resulting in defoliation and potential large yield losses. ASR infections began in January but became increasingly noticeable in March and April. “It caught these particular growers by surprise, and it hit them pretty hard,” said Marty Wiglesworth, Syngenta technical brand manager for fungicides.

Seed beans are generally harvested at the end of April into early May, so the majority of the affected acres should be out of the ground. Mexican growers will begin planting more soybeans closer to the Texas border in late May. According to Wiglesworth, the time gap between harvesting the seed beans and planting additional soybeans may be good news for U.S. soybean growers.

“We cannot foresee whether the impact on the U.S. crop will be minimal. We don’t know at this point,” Wiglesworth said. “It depends on whether there are nearby patches of volunteer soybeans or kudzu for ASR to live on until the newly planted Mexican crop becomes susceptible at R1. Scouting fields is the prudent thing to do, and the universities and Syngenta are actively engaged in scouting activities.”

Potentially, Wiglesworth said ASR could be equated to the wheat rust that comes yearly out of Mexico and Texas into the Midwest. “If ASR establishes itself on a regular basis in Mexico, one possibility is that it could follow a very similar pathway as wheat rust. Overwintering ASR present in Florida and Georgia has a harder time moving directly into the Midwest unless there are unusual weather patterns, but Mexico could serve as a more consistent source into the Midwest. At this time, however, experts believe the current risk for rust in east Texas is low.”

There are currently no effective fungicides labeled for use in Mexico for Asian Soybean Rust control, although agrichemical companies, including Syngenta, are currently pursuing emergency exemptions for rust specific fungicides, he said.

More on herbicide drift issues in Midsouth rice

In Tuesday’s RiceFax, one of our Extension contacts referred to the “irregular” nature of the suspected glyphosate drift damage he and others were seeing. We didn’t go into any explanation about what that meant. Space simply didn’t permit it.

A Mississippi farmer who called us this morning said that he also found that the damage in his own fields doesn’t look like previous episodes of herbicide drift damage.

“Before now, I might find that a corner or edge of one field had been really blasted by Roundup that blew over the property line,” said the grower. “This time, though, it’s kind of in streaks moving across the field. The rice looked okay up until we fertilized and flushed it, then it started turning brown.”

Extension workers have since looked at his rice and concluded that the damage was caused by glyphosate drift.

We’re hearing reports of the material moving quite a distance, upwards of four miles in at least one suspected case. As the farmer told us today, the damage was apparent as he drove down the road. “When I came to a tree line, it was still green, but on the other side of the tree line the vegetation turned brown again,” he said.

Nathan Buehring, Mississippi Extension Rice Specialist, has seen this same browning effect along roads in other affected areas.

Buehring and his colleagues have been trying to determine why drift damage is so much worse this year than in the past two seasons. One idea is that plants were already stressed due to cold temperatures and either too much moisture or too little, and that made them more susceptible.

Johnny Saichuk, Louisiana Extension Rice Specialist, also believes that atmospheric conditions may have promoted some of the long distance movement and streaking. In his Louisiana Rice Field Notes this week, Saichuk wrote: “When sprayed materials hang up in a layer of fog…it can be carried in unexpected patterns and destinations beyond normal considerations.” The result, he said, can be the irregular, streaked patterns being widely reported this year.

Growers in California’s Sacramento Valley probably see this kind of effect more than growers do in the Delta, which isn’t hemmed in by mountains. In 1998, one ag chemical company extensively tested a new rice herbicide in California rice and had no drift issues. The next year, though, conditions were different, and the compound moved a good deal, damaging fruit and causing a new set of problems for rice growers there.

In Mississippi, alone, 10,000 acres of rice will likely have to be replanted, and the number could go as high as 15,000, Buehring estimates. Another 20,000 acres has been affected to some extent by drift. The farmer who called us today said he was finding that at least some of the injured plants – initially assumed to be dead – are showing faint green growth, and their roots appear to be healthy. There’s every chance that at least some of those plants will rebound, he said. That further complicates the situation because the damaged plants will be starting over again almost as seedlings while rice that wasn’t hurt – or hurt as much – already is several inches tall. That will make for uneven stands and complicate management and harvest.

Drift issues have caught wide attention among both farmers and regulators in Mississippi. The state department of agriculture has been pulling staff out of other parts of the state to deal with complaints. Lester Spell, the state’s elected ag commissioner, was in the Delta, himself, last Saturday.

The long-term fear is that this year’s problems could lead to further regulation or limitations on how materials are applied.

Herbicide drift on rice prompts replanting in Mississippi

We'll have more on the subject tonight when we send out this week's RiceFax, but a couple of people emailed me this morning to find out the range of herbicide drift issues and probable replantings in Mississippi due to drift. Here are a couple of quick points:

• Mississippi will have at least 10,000 acres of rice replanted, and the figure could go as high as 15,000. That's from Nathan Buehring, Mississippi Extension Rice Specialist. Buehring said that, based on what he's seen and comments from other Extension workers, this probably is the worst year in terms of herbicide drift onto rice that the state has had. The state ag department dispatched extra personnel to the Delta last week, and Lester Spell, the state's ag commissioner, was in Cleveland on Saturday.
• Arkansas Rice Specialist Chuck Wilson said he is receiving drift reports there, too, but the scope of the problem doesn't seem to be anywhere close to what is turning up in Mississipp.

Sorting through AccuWeather's hurricane forecast for '06

AccuWeather just released its 2006 hurricane season forecast, one of several issued by various groups and universities every spring. AccuWeather’s forecast is a little different because it focuses on intensity and likely points of landfall, not just the number of named storms.

The Pennsylvania-based company is only predicting five hurricanes and a single tropical storm, but it says that a signicant amount of activity this year could be in highly populated parts of the country, particularly along the Atlantic Coast into the northeast.

Ken Reeves, an AccuWeather meteorologist, noted in the e-zine Diasternews.net that the power and location of a few storms can be more significant than the total number of hurricanes in a given season. He cites 1992, which had six named storms, a relatively low annual number. Yet, up until 2004, that was the most destructive hurricane season on record. Much of the damage came with Hurricane Andrew, which struck south Florida, taking a hard and expensive lick at Miami and surrounding areas.

In the Disasternews.net report, AccuWeather’s chief meteorologist, Jack Bastardi, called the 2006 season “a creeping threat” because of the potential size of storms and where they might hit. Here’s a synopsis of AccuWeather’s predictions:

• In June and July, the Texas Gulf Coast faces the greatest likelihood of a hurricane making landfall. That puts energy production at risk. Some rice may be vulnerable at that point, too.
• Starting as early as July, the risk starts shifting to the Carolinas and continues there through the season, something that could affect growers at harvest.
• From mid August into early September, the risk factor spreads northward to the more urbanized northeast. Hardly anyone thinks about hurricanes hitting that part of the world, but folks in New England still talk about the Long Island Express, a hurricane that hit the region in 1938, killing 600 people.
• Toward the end of the season, south Florida is again at risk.
• Overall, at least three of the storms could be Category 3 hurricanes.

Some hurricane specialists believe that the East Coast is more vulnerable in a year following a busy hurricane season along the Gulf Coast.

Post-Katrina building boom casts a shadow over south Mississippi farmland

Another potential victim of Hurricane Katrina may be farmland in south Mississippi. Small towns in that part of the state have seen a surge of new residents as people displaced by the hurricane look for homes away from the coast but still within commuting distance of where they work.

Towns like Poplarville and Picayune have seen dramatic growth since last fall. According to various estimates, Picayune’s population – just under 11,000 before Katrina – has swelled to something between 30,000 and 40,000. Even areas as far north as Hattiesburg are absorbing new residents. That has driven up prices for existing homes and prompted new development.

“Real estate prices have gone up 40% to 60% in these areas,” says Mike Howell, a Mississippi Extension Area Agronomist based in Collins. “I’ve heard of clear-cut pineland going for $6,000 an acre.”

For personal reasons, Howell has been following the real estate market closely. He and his wife each owned homes before they married, and both dwellings were left uninhabitable by Katrina. Lately, they have been house hunting in the Pearl River County area.

“My fear right now is that development will start working its way into our farmland,” Howell says. As he pointed out, crop acreage is usually fairly flat, already cleared and it tends to be close to good roads.

Accelerated farm borrowing becomes a troubling trend

Chuck Farr, a veteran crop consultant in Crawfordsville, Ark., told me today that it’s been unsettling to hear one farmer after another remark about how little time it's taken this season to rack up debt.

"They're saying that they owe the Farm Credit system more money at this point in 2006 than they did for the entire 2005 production season," said Farr, whose Mid-South Ag Consulting firm works across all the major field crops in his area. “I’ll bet I’ve heard that 20 times. There already has been a world of farm sales, and we’re still getting notices about new sales as growers find out they’re not getting loans."

The situation, he said, seems to be worst west of his area in a part of the state more heavily into rice and soybean production.The high cost of fuel and fertilizer, plus dry conditions in 2005, took a toll on rice and soybean producers, Farr said. Not to mention low commodity prices.

Growers in his area, who are mostly cotton producers, weren’t hit quite as hard. One reason, he said, is that it takes less pumping to irrigate or flood their heavier ground compared to areas to the west with more silt loam soils. But that's a relatively small difference when you take into account how much all inputs have risen, he added.

“What we’re seeing in that part of the state may be an indicator,” Farr said. “Next year, we might be finding the same situation in our cotton area, barring some major improvement.”

Deere's Cameco sugar cane harvesters to don green and yellow

From a John Deere press release today by way of our web site's Doane news feed:

The John Deere brand name will now make its way to sugar cane harvesting equipment with the roll-out of the new branding and the famous green-and-yellow color combination at Brazil's Agri-Show equipment show this week.

"The John Deere name is recognized as a global leader in many businesses," said Daryl Schloz, who is general manager and president of Cameco Industries, Inc., a subsidiary of Deere & Company. "As the world leader in sugar cane harvesting equipment, it is important to link our customers to the well-known John Deere values of integrity, quality, commitment and innovation."

Cameco has announced plans to re-name the company John Deere Thibodaux, Inc.

After Deere & Company acquired Cameco in 1998, Cameco continued to use the Cameco colors and trademark for sugar products. Now, however, Schloz said, by changing Cameco to John Deere Thibodaux Inc. and placing the John Deere brand on sugar cane harvesting machines, Deere provides an outward signal to customers that the sugar cane harvesting business is fully integrated with other aspects of the leading agricultural equipment company in the world.

Schloz said customers can be assured that they will continue to receive the same high level of committed service from the company, dealers, and support programs.

After the Agri-Show, production of the newly-branded 3510 sugar cane harvester will begin at the Catalao, Brazil, plant and continue at the Thibodaux, La., locations. Former Cameco facilities will now display John Deere Thibodaux Inc. signage.

New "cotton bug" will soon hit the Delta

FMC is about to unleash a new “cotton bug” in the Mississippi Delta. This one, which looks like a plant bug, is as big as a Volkswagen because, well, that’s exactly what it is. The VW Beetle also happens to be the grand prize in a promotion FMC has launched to promote its new insecticide, Carbine.

The car – dubbed the “Carbine Plant Bug” – will be given away in a special drawing, but not before it makes a tour of the Delta in June looking for Carbine signs in the fields of farmers participating in the contest. Prizes of up to $1,000 will be awarded as the car cruises through the region.

For more information, go to: catchtheplantbug.com.

Peanut planting conditions shift from too dry to too wet

Peanut planting doesn’t kick off in the Southeast to any real extent until May 15, which is the start of the prime planting period in the tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV) index system. Planting much before May 15 or much after June 15 exposed stands to higher levels of possible TSWV infection due to thrips.

We typically don’t crank up our peanut newsletter, PeanutFax, until after May 15 and expect to begin publishing it next Friday, May 19.

Last week we did make spot calls to several of our peanut contacts to find out how much acreage had been planted ahead of the May 15 period. John Beasley, Georgia Extension Peanut Specialist, said that planting progress had been running somewhat ahead of ’05 because dry spring conditions promoted growers to start planting at least some acreage if they caught showers. “We were in a very dry situation, and the feeling was that it might be better to go ahead and take advantage of any available moisture in case we remained in a dry pattern,” Beasley said late last week.

Georgia, like much of the rest of the region, did start receiving rain in the last two weeks, and some areas picked up excessive amounts.

Howard Small Jr., a crop consultant in Colquitt, Ga., said his area was actually running behind on peanut planting because it started receiving rains earlier than the rest of the state, and amounts have excessive in some locations. Small said that one of his farmers measured 10 inches in five days. Small poured seven inches out of his own gauge during that same period.

“All the bottoms are full of water, and all the fields already planted has suffered a good deal of washing,” Small said. “Four of my farmers haven’t planted any peanuts yet, and my three biggest growers are only about half through. At this point, very few farmers will think about planting before next Tuesday or Wednesday, provided we have ample sunshine and wind.”

A reminder: If you want to subscribe to PeanutFax or any of our other reports, go to agfax.com/subs.

California cotton off to late but picture-perfect start

California’s cotton crop is off to a late but fast start, based on reports late last week (see our May 12 issue of MiteFax: SJV Cotton).

Successive rains throughout much of March and April delayed planting. When growers could finally jump into the field in early May, the weather turned relatively favorable. In many cases, cotton is emerging to a stand in less than a week and hitting first true leaf within another week. The crop still has a long way to go. Upland varieties may not be affected much, but there remains concern that Pima varieties, which need longer growing seasons, could be in jeopardy if they run into a cooler fall. Earlier, it was projected that California growers would grow more Pima than Upland varieties this year for the first time, but that seems unlikely now, based on more current estimates.

More will be known about that on Tuesday, May 23, at the fifth annual Pima Cotton Summit in Visalia. Jeff Elder, vice chairman of Supima’s board and vice president of cotton marketing for J.G. Boswell Co., will give an overview on the crop size and condition.

Harry Cline reported in Western Farm Press on May 5 that the “most optimistic” projections now are for 250,000 acres (compared to 290,000 that USDA had been projecting) At one point, there were predictions that Californians might grow as much as 325,000 acres this year. Some observers, Cline noted, say that with all the weather delays the final Pima crop might only equal last year’s 230,000 acres.

Surfactant and/or additive burn reported in Midsouth cotton

We heard a couple of reports late in the week about burning in cotton. The effect appears to be linked to surfactants and/or additives.

• Tennessee Extension Cotton Specialist Scott Stewart said he looked at some cotton that “extreme” surfactant burn. “Products used were Roundup Original Max + Bidrin + surfactant + AMS. Roundup Original Max has a heavy surfactant load as is, and adding more surfactant to it - along with Bidrin or really any OP insecticide which can act like a surfactant - will often cause serious leaf burn. Adding surfactants to the glyphosate products that already contain surfactant and then mixing with insecticides like Bidrin, Orthene or dimethoate is not recommended.”
• In his firm’s Sunday Ag Report, Roger Carter of AMS, Inc., in Clayton, La., noted: “We have noticed some extreme burn this year from combinations of glyphosate, Staple, and/or insecticide and various additives. When adding Staple or insecticide to OMax or WeatherMax, do not add any adjuvant including ammonium sulfate. Otherwise, expect more physical burn. Cotton will recover quickly and be a green field once again in about 10 days, but will look ugly for at least seven days.”

Chevron Invests in Large-Scale Texas Biodiesel Facility

Chevron, I guess, will now be investing some of its oil profits in the biodiesel field. Click on the heading for the full press release.

Study provides new understanding of spontaneous hybridization

This is an interesting article to read in light of questions about movement of herbicide-resistant genes among crop varieties or outcrossings to wild plants. CLICK ON HEADING.
Synopsis: Plant and animal breeders have long used hybridization to transfer useful traits between species. But does the same process happen without human aid? In a new study in the June issue of American Naturalist, researchers from Indiana University and Rice University explore how spontaneous hybridization – known as adaptive trait introgression – has a vital impact on adaptation and evolutionary diversification.