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Articles by Floyd Counties
Texas High Plains: Cotton Development and Insect Pest Scouting - Video
Texas High Plains: Cotton Development and Insect Pest Scouting – Video June 9, 2020 By Blayne Reed, Texas AgriLife Extension County Agent for Hale, Swisher, and Floyd Counties Cotton fleahopper. Photo: Danielle Sekula Hey folks! As you may know, we were not able to host our annual Field Scout School this year. Don’t worry, opportunity still knocks! Dr. Suhas Vyavhare and I recorded our 2020 cotton scouting presentation when we trained my few field scouts our first day of work.
Texas Plains Cotton: Heavy Thrips; Storms Bring Rains, Hail
Normal (left) and damaged cotton seedlings in Lubbock County. The seedling on the right survived wind damage and the growing point is alive, producing new leaves. Photo: Calvin Trostle, Texas AgriLife Extension General Status The biggest event of the week happened last night (June 4) with a rainstorm finally moving through the area. While widespread, rainfall totals varied from “at least we finally smelled rain” up to 2-inches. The largest totals were also accompanied by a focused and pounding hail.
Texas High Plains Cotton: Hot and Dry, Thrips Still Increasing - Podcast
Texas High Plains Cotton: Hot and Dry, Thrips Still Increasing – Podcast June 5, 2020 By Blayne Reed, Texas AgriLife Extension County Agent for Hale, Swisher, and Floyd Counties June cotton fighting its way through heat, wind, blowing sand and thrips. Photo: Seth Byrd, OSU Cotton Specialist Rain critical, dryland in peril, thrips very high in places like Tulia, a few cotton aphids starting, pillbugs and other things in no-till or minimum till with heavy cover.
Texas Plains: Some Heavy Thrips Spots, Pillbugs Doing Damage - Podcast
Texas Plains: Some Heavy Thrips Spots, Pillbugs Doing Damage – Podcast May 29, 2020 By Blayne Reed, Texas AgriLife Extension County Agent for Hale, Swisher, and Floyd Counties Thrips damaged cotton. Photo: University of Tennessee Check out my latest audio podcast for Hale and Swisher counties. It starts with the nearby area IPM agent Kerry Siders for Hockley and Cochran Counties and includes John Thobe for Bailey, Castro, and Parmer counties, too.
Texas High Plains Cotton: Heavy Thrips Populations - Podcast
Texas High Plains Cotton: Heavy Thrips Populations – Podcast May 21, 2020 By Blayne Reed, Texas AgriLife Extension County Agent for Hale, Swisher, and Floyd Counties Thrips injury on young cotton. ©Debra L Ferguson Stock Images In this week’s High Plains IPM Podcast Blayne Reed and the other county agents discuss thrips populations and management options.
Texas High Plains Wheat: Checking Freeze Damage, Disease Status - Podcast
Texas High Plains Wheat: Checking Freeze Damage, Disease Status – Podcast April 16, 2020 By Blayne Reed, Texas AgriLife Extension County Agent for Hale, Swisher, and Floyd Counties Freeze injury (silvery colored streaks) on wheat seven days after below freezing temperatures. This week we cover detecting freeze damaged wheat heads, soil temps for planting, and wheat disease status.
Texas Plains Cotton: When to Start Applying Harvest Aids?
General Status We have received decent and substantial rainfall events since our last newsletter two weeks ago. This came too late to help our earlier planted corn and almost too late to help our cotton much. The rains were enough that we might be able to ease our last boll-fill irrigations but the largest help was for our later grain crops and any intended wheat acres.
Texas Plains Pests: Cotton Passed Cut-Out; Mites, Aphids in Corn, Sorghum
General Status The summer scouting season starts to draw to a close without any notable bollworm migration, flights, or cotton infestation to speak of while Banks grass mites and sugarcane aphids are keeping the pressure up in our late grain crops. The above average temperatures and apparent ‘rain free zones’ continue to task our irrigation systems past their capacity for another week while dryland crops not already made look to crumble to dust.
Texas Plains Pests: Migratory Bollworms Remain an Uncertainty
Trap with Bollworm - Corn Earworm - CEW moths. Photo: Gus Lorenz, Extension Entomologist, University of Arkansas, Division of Ag General Status Very little has changed over the past week in weather or pest status with crops, mites, and aphids only getting ‘hotter.’ A change in the weather during crunch time and peak water use for so many of our fields would give a great aid, if the rain would come gently.
Texas Plains Pests: Cotton Quiet; Sugarcane Aphids, Banks Grass Mite Active in Grains
Sugarcane aphids cluster on the underside of grain sorghum leaves. The pest decreases yields and secretes a sticky waste called “honeydew” that gums up combine harvesters. (Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service photo by Dr. Raul Villanueva) This week has been both very quiet and manic at the same time. Not much has developed on the pest side for cotton this week, while sugarcane aphids and Banks grass mites have been very busy in our reproductive stage grain crops.
Texas Plains Cotton: Pests Mostly Quiet, False Chinch Bugs on the Rise
False chinch bugs. Photo: University of Tennessee Despite some cooler days, we have had enough hot weather and time without rainfall to give us some clues as to our early damaged and cold shocked crops and whether they have seriously damaged and limited root systems, or if they will work well enough to develop crops properly.
Texas Plains Cotton: Good Growth in Heat, Mostly Quiet on Insects
General Status Hot with some of the first triple digit temperatures of the growing season. Which, despite being uncomfortable for humans, is what our late cotton needs, assuming it is rooting down too. Our pollinating corn has another opinion about the subject. Our target 1st bloom date in cotton is July 4th.
Texas Plains IPM: Cotton - Fleahoppers Biggest Concern; Pests Rising in Corn, Sorghum
General Status For the first week since the start of planting season, we did not have a damaging weather event. It was not too cold, too windy, or too wet and we did not have a major hail or flash flood event that I am aware of. We are starting to rack up some heat units, but highs have not been on the outrageous side yet. There was some moisture in the area this week in the form of something that could actually be described as cotton showers.
Texas Plains Cotton: Surviving Fields 10 Days Behind
General Status Even the best of our cotton fields looks like it has had it pretty rough, mostly because it has. We continue to lose marginal fields to the plethora of issues plaguing the situation or severe weather. Even with these losses and surviving cotton fields dragging along through their respective situations late and developing slowly, I still see potential for our surviving cotton as long as we have the plant population and a sizable break in the weather situation.
Texas Cotton: Planting and Soil Temperatures
Cotton gets off to its best start when planted in a recommended 69°F consistent temperature soil (roughly 64°F bare mini-mum with a warming trend). This winter and spring the soil temperature has followed the trends of the air temperature trends fairly closely as the seed zone has been drier for most fields. Higher moisture content in the soil usually slows the soil’s response to air temperatures.
Texas Plains: Pests Are Present but Mostly Below Thresholds
Measurable rainfall again crisscrossed the region late last week and last weekend dropping moisture for most of us. The latest rounds did not have any damaging weather with them that I am aware of like some swaths of previous rounds did. With extended cool periods of last season and the resulting quality cotton fiber problems (aided by a late and rough start) fresh in our minds, a few days brought on concerns for our cotton quality to the surface.
Texas Plains Pests: Increasing or Crashing, Depending on Crop Moisture
Rain showers crisscrossed the region again in the past seven days bringing much needed moisture but unfortunately for several hotspots it came with severe and damaging weather too. With the best information I have, every corner of our three counties got at least some measurable moisture. In very few cases was it enough to impact NOAA’s drought monitor with the driest areas still getting the least moisture while a few other localized areas got a brief deluge.
Texas Plains: Pest Activity Picking Up with Moisture
The humidity has been up over the past few days and the region has received a widespread rain event. I cannot say the rain was all we were hoping for or all we needed. According to what I can find quickly on http://www.texaspivot.com/pivrain3 the rainfall this week ranged between 0.04 inches and 0.46 inches across Hale, Swisher, & Floyd. Rain remains in the short-term forecast. Any rain at this point is helpful but the sooner the better the help for most fields.
Texas Plains Crops: Drought Taking Toll on Plants and Pests
The persistent drought conditions are taking their toll. Most dryland fields are already few and far between but the areas within Hale, Swisher, and Floyd that have received the least amount of rainfall this season, in some cases less than 3-inches since October, are looking at serious tough times for irrigated without help soon. By soon, I mean rain in a matter of days.
Texas Plains Cotton: Plenty of Pests, PGR Decisions, Irrigation Needs
Some beneficial rains did cross the area late last week and weekend with some minimal damage reported. These rains were welcome but far from filling our dry soil profile or very widespread. This week our humidity has been up and temperatures have been moderated somewhat. This was something of a much-needed break to our few acres of grain and hay crops. Cotton is still progressing through its growth stages very rapidly with most fields already in bloom stage.
Texas Plains: Crops Progressing Rapidly; Cotton Fruit Loss a Concern
We remain hopeful for a soaking rain but recently the skies only like to send heat units. We certainly are racking up those heat units. Unfortunately, what corn we have is pollinating and sorghum at boot. Cotton is still squaring but moving through stages fast. It may or may not be a fast-paced developmental record, but cotton is moving at a quick clip with several fields sporting blooms a bit sooner than many of us expected.
Texas Plains Pests: Insects Flaring, Weeds Toughening Up in High Heat
This week we have seen the return of some rather harsh hot and dry conditions. Most days the temperatures have been triple digit but if not, it was still in the upper 90’s with nighttime temperatures not cooling off all that much or for very long. What has really made the environment harsh for our crops and spray schedules has been the relentless winds that seem to only change patterns to gust to ridiculous rates. Heat units can certainly rack up quick in this environment.
Texas Plains Cotton: Irrigated Fields Look Good, Dryland Has Failed
After a hard-fought emergence battle, and some area rains, we are starting to see some green countryside in West Texas. It is a good to look across our irrigated fields and see green replacing brown as the dominant color for that spot. Generally speaking, it is a sign of some successes causing good vegetative growth. Most dryland fields remain brown as producers decide which direction to take them now that dryland cotton has mostly failed.
Texas Plains Cotton: Thrips Resurgence; Scout for Fleahoppers, Lygus
Showers continue to cross our region, the latest round this week leaving the gift of between 0.3” and nearly 2” with most of our fields getting around 0.75”. Slowly but steadily fairly frequent rainfall events (or almost rain events in many cases) through June has tried to relieve our extreme environmental conditions. The situation was so dry coming into June and weather between these rain events so hot, dry, and windy little headway has been made for most fields.
Texas Plains Cotton: Heat - Thrips - Stand Issues
Hot and dry environmental conditions are still predominating our world and remain our main obstacle to overcome. Some of us did receive relief last night with the arrival of some spotty and electrically hot showers that passed through. According to public data from texaspivot.com area rainfall across Hale, Swisher, & Floyd varied from 0” up to 2.67” overnight and this morning with most of the fields that received rainfall received less than 0.5”.
Texas Plains Cotton: Wireworms, Thrips, Drought Stress
Welcome to the 2018 growing season and another round of the Plains Pest Management Newsletter here to serve and update Hale, Swisher, & Floyd County with pest and crop updates and IPM solution recommendations. While we are excited about this season’s potential and look forward to another year of serving our growers, party favors and happy dances are few out and about the countryside at this time. Desperate rain dances are more the normal today.
Texas: Field Scout School, Plainview, May 31
Dr. Suhas Vyavhare, District Cotton Entomologist, John David Gonzolez, EA – IPM Palmer, Bailey, Castro, and myself invite you and your colleges to a Field Scout School on Thursday, May 31, 2018. The free training will be from 8:45 a.m. to around 12:30 p.m. in Plainview at the Ollie Liner Center (2000 S. Columbia, Plainview, TX, 79072). Three CEU’s are being offered, two IPM and one drift management.
Texas Cotton: Wireworms in the High Plains a Threat to Establishment
After being alerted to some potential heavy wireworm populations in the area by Dr. Pat Porter, District Entomologist, I have been making rounds behind the planter in some of the area’s earliest planted cotton fields. What I am finding is troubling. The population of wireworms, or rather the amount of their resulting feeding damage on yet to emerge seedings, I am finding indicates a very high threat level to cotton stand establishment.
Welsh Heritage Tea planned to promote ancestrial ties in Polk and Floyd counties - : Local
Gray is president of Euharlee Valley Historical Society, which supports and helps plan the annual WeshFest in Rockmart. Decorations will follow a Welsh theme of green, red and white. Daffodils, Welsh flags and the Red Dragon will also be used in the color scheme. Admission will be $10 at the door with children 12 and under admitted for $5.
Rush: Virginia budgets responsibly - Roanoke Times: Commentary
By Nick Rush Rush represents the 7th District, which includes Montgomery and Floyd Counties, in the House of Delegates. Rush serves on the House Committee on Appropriations. An online service is needed to view this article in its entirety. You need an online service to view this article in its entirety. Choose an online service.
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