Southeast Cotton: Mixed Reports After New Weather Conditions

“Well, to the south of me is still really wet even though it hasn’t rained in a few days. We have had some pretty warm temperatures, but people are still struggling to get in the fields. A lot of people have caught up and finally got some fertilizers and plant growth regulators out. In the fields that have caught up, the cotton looks really good. I will say, I don’t think I’ve ever put out so many shots of PGRs.

“Other than that, our attention has shifted from plant bugs to stinkbugs. The corn is drying down and the stinkbugs are just flooding out of there. We’re are spraying a lot of fields for stinkbugs. We are also applying fungicide for target spot. That has kind of blown up recently. I have a field that was five nodes and about white flower and target spot has about a third of the plant defoliated already. The rainy, humid and hot conditions are just perfect for target spotting and mildew. We are putting out a good bit of pot ash and nitrogen in those sandy fields.

“We’ve had some issues with the corn earworm over the past three weeks, and the V2 Technology has actually held up against it. Usually, you can guarantee V3 will handle a moderate to heavy flight, but the V2 has done the job so far.

“Some cotton has just been abandoned. Some fields were just planted late and then there was so much rain and people just let it go. Some places got up to 14 inches of rain in about 5 days. I guess when it rains, it pours.

“Our peanuts range from 45 days old to 100 days old. Just in the past 10 days, we picked up early and late leaf spot in some fields. That probably has a lot to do with being behind on fungicides. Then we’ve got white mold coming into the picture. The temperatures have just been perfect for that mold to go crazy. We’re trying to stay on top of an application schedule; we’re moving from every 14 days to every 10 days for fungicides. It’s also better to be early with those applications than late. Right now, the predominant thing we’re seeing is early leaf spot. Late leaf spot is typically more aggressive as far as leaf shed.

“We will be putting out some Dimilin sprays for looper and velvetbean moths we’ve seen flying lately. Dimilin typically keeps us from having to spray an expensive insecticide down the road.”

“Well, we have a lot more insect activity in our cotton. It’s looking like we’re on the front end of pressure from bollworms. We are right in the middle of the first flight that came over from corn. We’re seeing a good bit of stinkbug activity in the bolls and some people around here are already triggering the first sprays. Plant bugs are kind of thrown to the side when stinkbugs make an entrance. We aren’t having many issues with spidermites because of all this rain, and the aphids certainly plummeted thanks to the aphid fungus.

“In soybeans, I looked at a field and didn’t see anything out of whack, but I saw a lot of different species. I’d say there’s no serious trouble and the defoliators aren’t here in mass yet, but I think that will probably change pretty soon.”