Late-Week Cotton, July 25: Market ends lower, bollworms take flight, late crop complicates wheat planting

AgFax.Com - Your Online Ag News Source

July 25, 2009

By Owen Taylor

Editor, AgFax Media

Cotton Market Pulls A Lloyd Bridges On Friday

Meaning, it took a dive. (If you're too young to understand the reference, do a web search for "Sea Hunt".) Cotton slipped sharply, and Duane Howell - DTN’s cotton correspondent - says the market may have established a near-term top.

Read his full report.

Better weather and crop conditions in the Delta and Texas also could account for the bearish turn, Scott Stiles writes in this week's Arkansas Cotton Update. Stiles, an U. of Arkansas ag economist, also provides an analysis of where nitrogen prices are likely going.

See his report on page 3.

Roundup Ready or Ready For Roundup?

Rome Ethredge, Extension Agent in Seminole County, Georgia, took this photo of a pile of Palmer amaranth pulled from a peanut field in his county this week. It's an all-too-familiar site in both the Southeast and Delta this year as growers bring in crews to chop and pull a weed that no longer succumbs to Roundup, with that resistance further complicated by ALS resistance. “I’ve seen more hand pulling than ever this year and more rope wick applicators for our glyphosate and ALS resistant Palmer amaranth,” Ethredge noted in this week’s Seminole Crop E-News.

More Moths Taking Wing

Parts of the Southeast are experiencing a larger bollworm/corn earworm moth flight. Cotton newsletters from both Georgia and South Carolina showed clear spikes in bollworm moth captures to date.

“Captures of bollworm moths have dramatically increased again,” Jeremy Green, Extension Entomologist, reported in the Clemson Cotton/Soybean Insect Newsletter on Thursday. “How high will these numbers go, and how long will the pressure last once these moths start depositing eggs in high densities? I think they will go higher, and I think that this flight out of corn could persist for a lengthy period at high levels. The window for corn planting was a long one, so we have corn that is maturing at varying times."

That likely means extended bollworm/earworm pressure, Greene said. Be aware of egg lay and moth flushes in cotton, "particularly if you have sprayed for bugs with an OP alone and have not used a pyrethroid yet,” he added.

While Bt varieties provide a level of protection, check for escapes and follow threshold guidelines (included with his report)

“Also, be aware of corn earworm (bollworm) in soybeans (called ‘podworm’ in soybeans), especially considering this level of moth activity, so check soybeans that are blooming or setting pods,” Greene emphasized.

Links to both reports:

• Georgia Cotton Pest Management, 7-24, Corn earworm pressure high; fall armyworms reported at low to moderate numbers; aphids still lingering.

• South Carolina Cotton & Soybean Insect Report, 7-23, Bollworm & Tobacco Budworm; Captures of Bollworm moths have increased.

Late Cotton Complicates Wheat Planting

Late planted cotton could bump into short recrop intervals where growers want to plant wheat after the pickers leave the field, according to Larry Steckel, Tennessee Extension Weed Specialist.

“Please keep in mind there are just a few commonly used layby herbicides that have a recrop interval short enough where sowing wheat this fall would still be on label,” Steckel writes in this week’s University of Tennessee IPM Newsletter.

See his report and a table of herbicide wheat recrop intervals on page 2.

California's Cotton Feeling The Heat

Temperatures in the San Joaquin Valley - where most of California's cotton is grown - hit 111 and 112 in places last weekend, July 18-19, and temperatures have pretty solidly been in triple digits since then, from 102 to 108 in places.

"It's suppose to be 102 today, and a farmer and I agreed that would seem pleasant at this point," joked Tony Touma of Bio-Ag Consulting Friday. Touma and other PCAs (Professional Crop Advisors) are wondering what effect the intense heat will have on the fruit load.

For more on the heat and crop in California, see this week's MiteFax, our report covering cotton and other row crops in the SJV.

Plant Bugs Once Again "Pest Of The Week" In Arkansas

That's how Gus Lorenz puts it in this week's Arkansas Cotton Report. For a couple of weeks, plant bugs were eclipsed by bollworms. A heavy moth flight - loaded with high levels of pyrethroid resistance - moved through the state for a couple of weeks, pushing plant bugs to the back row in terms of attention. But now plant bug numbers are building.

See comments from Lorenz on page 1.