Crop Scan AgReport: Cotton Mostly Planted

Kerry Siders is Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Agent-IPM for Hockley, Cochran, and Lamb Counties.

Cotton here on the “West Plains” portion of the Southern High Plains of Texas is mostly planted. There will be dryland acres which will be planted over the next week or two. Our insurance deadline for planting in Hockley County is June 5.

We have been blessed with some rainfall the past couple of weeks, but not anything near which would move us out of the drought category. The weather events which brought us some rain also caused a string of nighttime temperatures to drop into the low 40s, causing chilling injury to near-emerging cotton. This weather has thrown us a curve ball in the completion of planting and could cause some growers to divert acres to alternative crops.

Cotton stand evaluations are our next priority as we visit fields. Most of our cotton acres are on 40” rows, so we generally count the number of plants in 13’ of row (1/1000th of an acre). We would consider 26 plants (2 plants per foot) in that 13’ space to be 26,000 plants per acre. This would be a minimum good stand on irrigated cotton. Ideally, your stand would have closer to 40,000 plants per acre or closer to 3 plants per foot. Dryland acres can dip down into the 19,000 range or 1.5 plants per row foot. In either situation, if you get much below these standards, you most likely need to consider your insurance standing and a replant. Along with this evaluation is stand consistency across the field.

Considerable moisture will be needed before the end of June to move our drought status and keep this crop moving forward and making development progress. Currently, we are finding a few fields with thrips and wireworm activity. We are seeing weed pressure increasing as well. So, both a post-emerge with a residual herbicide applications will be necessary very soon if not applied at planting. Another issue which producers will need to give attention to will be implementing their fertility plan. What fertilizer one might can afford needs to maximized by being applied in a timely fashion. Do have fertilizer in place before the end of July. Later applications can delay maturity.