by Robert Bowling, Stephen Biles, Danielle Sekula-Ortiz, and Kate Harrell Sugarcane Aphid Update: As February was fading into the sunset abundant sugarcane aphid (SCA) populations were observed on volunteer and ratoon sorghum in south Texas. Their early population increase was attributed to unseasonably warm and dry conditions in January and February. There was concern around the possibility of early season SCA outbreaks on south TX sorghum if unseasonably warm conditions persisted. Fortunately, a change in weather patterns brought rain and cooler conditions in March. Recent surveys of SCA… Read More →

by Emi Kimura and Gaylon Morgan, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service Effective and season-long weed control in cotton starts with preplant weed management, starting clean to stay clean. The following herbicides are some viable options of burndown herbicides to start the 2016 cotton season with clean field. • EPSP herbicides (Group 9) Glyphosate (e.g., Roundup PowerMax, Touchdown Total, Touchdown Hi-Tech, and WeatherMax) controls most winter annual grass and broadleaf weeds such as henbit (Photo 1) and perennial grass such as johnsongrass (Photo 8), bindweeds, Texas blueweed, and silverleaf… Read More →

by Thomas Isakeit, Professor and Extension Plant Pathologist I have prepared two factsheets on bacterial blight of cotton and cotton root rot. They can be accessed at Cotton.tamu.edu. The bacterial blight factsheet has photographs that will be useful in diagnosing this disease. There has been a resurgence in this disease in Texas in recent years, with some yield losses documented in other states such as Mississippi. Since the severity of this disease is driven by rainy weather, I have no prognosis for the 2016 season. The cotton root… Read More →

by Dr. Calvin Trostle, Professor & Extension Agronomist, Lubbock, (806) 723-8432, ctrostle@ag.tamu.edu Over the past several weeks light freezing conditions have occurred in north Texas, the northern Rolling Plains, and more pronounced freezes at the top of the Texas Panhandle. No reports yet have indicated strong injury other than a few fields in Lipscomb Co. Those fields were injured March 21, so injurious temperatures likely needed to be in the mid-20s or lower. As of March 29 some wheat was at second joint, and Lipscomb Co. ag. extension… Read More →