Mississippi Agricultural Consultants Association

Reporting from the North Delta is Billy Price, Charleston
5/20/13 – Wheat has started to turn, yields will be all over the board but I think we have above average crop. Army worms started showing up about ten days ago but so far they are on the ground and very little head clipping.
Corn is over with and is a mess on some farms, still trying to get herbicides out and trying to get fertilizer out also. Suggest some of you listen to this comment, WE, as a group, need to get involved with the new farm bill. We have a number of farmers who have already filed preventive planting on their corn and cotton acres. These fields will lay out for 2013 season and depending on their coverage they will receive a pretty decent check. We need to see if there is something out there for us.
Cotton is still being planted on acres that crop insurance wasn’t purchased but it looks like heck especially the older cotton, we are treating cutworms on thin stands. We can’t let cutworms take any plants. We received 2 to 4.5 inches of rain late last week and more to come, this is 46 seasons I have been in the field and have never seen a spring like this one.
I hope thing are better in your area, we had more farmers in our area to tell us more cotton would be planted before the weather moved in, so things can turn south fast. Will start to worry about things I have control over because this mess is out of my hands.

Reporting from the South Delta is Trent LaMastus, Cleveland
5/20/13 – Corn- very low insect pressure and from V5 – V10 growth stage. We’re getting the last of our herbicides and Nitrogen applications out now. Most of my area missed last week’s rain and we actually started the first irrigation today (Monday).
Soybeans- about 35% planted, maybe 60% of that is to a stand, VE to V3 growth stage. The wind is making herbicide applications difficult. Overall beans look ok, only one field replanted so far.
Cotton- I may have 200 acres up to a stand, scheduled to check it Tuesday for the first time. The rest is being planted now or still in the sack. There is talk of some cotton to follow wheat.
Wheat is turning, looks fair to very good.

Reporting from South Mississippi is Trey Bullock, Hattiesburg
5/21/13 – Peanuts are now 70% planted. I think there are 60 acres out of the ground. Peanuts will be 100% planted by Thursday/Friday. 900+ acres/grower planted in a week will make for a tough harvest season. We will need a good harvest season and will have to start early. Peanuts are coming up to a good stand in 7-8 days.
Cotton is 40% planted. Moisture is still good and more efforts will be put towards cotton starting Thursday if rain holds off on Wednesday. A good shower, as hard as it is to believe, wouldn’t hurt. Many acres of pre’s have been applied and need to be rained in.
Wheat has changed a lot in last week. Hot weather and no rain has been just what we needed on wheat. May have some ready to cut middle of next week.
Corn is looking good for the most part. Still areas in corn fields where water stood for a while that corn is still yellow, but most has a good color and has recovered from anaerobic conditions. Corn ranges from V-7 to V-11. One grower has planted 500 acres of corn this week.
Let’s keep the Oklahoma tornado victims in our prayers.

Reporting from the South Delta is Donny Adams, Greenville
5/21/13 – We’re planting cotton – some is up and some not. Oldest has 1 true leaf. There will be some replanting but we’re not concerned at this time. This spring seems like 199. Hopefully this crop will turn out to be a record breaker like that year. We’re picking up thrips (and western flower thrips) and will probably treat at the end of the week or early next week.
Soybeans – just planting and up to V3 with no insect issues at this time.

Reporting from East Mississippi is Phillip McKibben, Maben
5/21/13 – Our emerged crops look really good; it’s the other 75% that we are concerned about.
We’ve had corn replaced by beans, now being replaced by cotton as intended crops. One thing for sure about our cotton. We WILL plant this cotton in May… even it stretches out until May 40th.

Reporting from the South Delta is Allen McKnight, Greenville
5/13/13 – Corn: Finally finished spraying herbicides and fertilizing all corn last week – had to pull every trick in the book to get it all done this year. Most corn is anywhere from V4 – V9. Oldest corn is hitting rapid growth stage and finally beginning to look really good. Have had a few stinkbugs and very few worms this year.
Soybeans: Had several fields where ryegrass came back from winter burndown and had to be retreated because everything was taking too long to start planting. Oldest soybeans at V3 – majority of soybeans still not planted. Started back to hitting dryer fields today, hopefully we’ll get a lot more done this week before another rain comes. One more rain and several will be considering prevented planting on cotton, then going to more soybeans. It has been a tough year to get everything done in a timely fashion.
Wheat: All wheat is fully headed and tipping over – looks like slowed down a little and may not be ready to cut by June 1st. Some wheat had pretty bad rusts and received fungicide treatments – other did not. Most insects have been light in wheat – have seen several rice stinkbugs and a few brown stinkbugs, but not enough to treat for. Several armyworms (1/2 – 1”) – most still down low in canopy and not showing much feeding signs up high yet.

Reporting from the South Delta is Herbert Jones, Leland
5/13/13 – Corn – Stinkbugs: Finding low numbers, less than 2 % adults. Found a few egg masses on leaves. May have to spray selective borders next week.
Cotton just up to first true leaf stage of growth. No pest found on cotton today.
Soybeans – Few beans up but majority will be planted as soon as fields dry up enough to plant.

Reporting from Northeast Mississippi is Homer Wilson, Fulton
5/14/13 – Field work has been at a standstill for about two weeks. Temperatures look better in the forecast and our first cotton seed should go in the ground today. Having to redo some burn down in places. Trying to get some Nitrogen on corn and even expect a little more to be planted. We only have about 40 acres of soybeans planted. Lots of aphids and thrips in corn. Sprayed about 150 acres of corn for aphids and the color changed back to normal in 2 days. Overall, our ground is very wet – having to hunt for dry spots to work. Our wheat crop showing first signs of maturing and it looks to be a fine crop.

Reporting from South Mississippi is Trey Bullock, Hattiesburg
5/14/13 – Rainfall totals since last Friday were from 2″ to 4.25″. Out of 780 acres of cotton planted 10-14 days ago, 675 will have to be replanted. Some replanting began yesterday (Monday).
Peanuts planted last Wednesday/Thursday are not up but looks like they are gonna be fine and should be up middle of this week. Growers should be able to resume planting middle of this week.
Corn is from V-6 to V-10. Corn looks good for the most part. Corn fields planted behind peanuts have some volunteer peanuts in them. Fields stayed too wet to get back in to kill peanuts. We will either have to live with them are get drop nozzles to get coverage. No other issues in corn right now other than saturated spots.
Wheat is drying down very slowly. Full season varieties are just at soft dough and may be too late harvesting to plant anything other than grain sorghum. As of now, weather forecast for the rest of the week looks promising for growers to finally get in the fields and plant crops.

Reporting from East Mississippi is Bert Falkner, West Point
5/14/13 – Corn is from V2-V6 growth stage and we’re still planting a little on both dry land and irrigated land – not a lot, just finishing up fields. No insect pressure on corn yet, but waterlogged and nutrient (zinc and phosphorus) deficiencies are showing up, drier weather should improve these symptoms. We’ve had some damage, possibly from Southern corn root worm in a field or 2 in Noxubee County. I’ve noticed that where we split fields last year with ½ peanuts and ½ corn the corn behind corn is yellow, stunted and sick but the corn behind peanuts looks good and is growing. This is very noticeable at this stage in the game.
Wheat stage is from seed formation to milky ripe with fungicide on everything. In 2012 we started cutting corn on May 18th. This year we are not even close to have a field ready to cut. I’m seeing Septoria low in the plant but it’s staying there, head diseases are limited to a few spots, a little bacterial stripe but no rust. Some wheat should cut pretty well in places where we have good drainage.
We started planting cotton yesterday (5/13). Actually, every type of crop seed we plant is being delivered by retailers right now. We need to miss a rain this weekend.

Reporting from the South Delta is Dee Boykin, Yazoo City
5/7/2013 – We’re still saturated and temps are well below normal, but looks like we’ve got a few days of sunshine ahead. Soil temperatures had been in the 60’s and even into the 70’s but at 10am yesterday we recorded 58 degrees.
Our wheat crop continues to progress with developmental stage from flowering to dough. Every acre has received a fungicide application and any fungal diseases appear to be under control at this point. It appears that poor drainage is going to be our primary cause of yield loss.
My area managed to get over 90% of intended corn acres planted and we’re scouting corn from emerging to V7. This spring has been a testament to starter fertilizer, especially in fields that are following corn from the previous growing season. There’s also an obvious benefit to having a good row to elevate the plants out of the more saturated soil. We’ve been analyzing plant tissue samples on the corn that is V4 or above. The most common deficiency at this point has been Boron with Phosphorus, Sulfur, Zinc, Magnesium and Manganese being deficient in many fields. We’re adding foliar fertilizers to herbicide applications that are going out on these fields and making some applications of fertilizer alone where we’ve already got our herbicides out. In most cases we’re not trying to correct the P and S deficiencies with foliar in hopes that the plants will benefit from these nutrients that are in the soil when the weather is a little more conducive to plant growth and nutrient uptake. All things considered, we feel that we still have good yield potential if Mother Nature will cooperate from this point on.
We have less than 5% of our soybeans planted and they’re from preemerge to 2nd trifoliate. The older soybeans took a long time to break through and were stressed upon emergence only to be greeted by a couple of frosts. They look rough! Hopefully we’ll get back to planting by the week’s end.
We had about a thousand acres of cotton planted before the last monsoonal week. Don’t know what to expect from this. We’ll begin digging to investigate later this week.
Our next concern for this time of year is the possibility of flood waters or backwater. The Yazoo and Sunflower Rivers are at the tops of their banks. The Yazoo continues to flow since the Mississippi is below flood stage at Vicksburg so we’ll begin to see a fall this week according to NOAA. The gates that release the water from the Sunflower are closed at this point as far as I know. This will cause the water to begin to back into fields soon since there’s still rain water from north of us headed down stream. This could be a problem for areas west of the Whittington Canal. We’ll wait and see.

Reporting from South Mississippi is Trey Bullock, Hattiesburg
5/7/2013 – Growers should be able to plant a few fields this week. Had a little cotton planted yesterday(Monday). Soil temps were borderline but growers are going to plant it now if ground will hold them up. Soil temps should be good by Wednesday and hopefully they will be able to go wide open on peanuts and cotton.
Corn is from V-5 to V-8 and looks pretty good. It finally has a good color and is starting to grow. Army worms in low numbers in some corn fields, but nothing to worry about as of yet. Growers were able to start back side dressing and applying herbicides yesterday.
Early varieties of wheat are reaching dough stage and disease is really picking up. Glume blotch is in every field as well as bacterial leaf streak. Rice stink bugs and leaf footed bugs are increasing as well. Most are still around borders and we may treat some fields. Will assess these fields today and make a decision. Wheat needs some hot, sunny days.

Reporting from the North Delta is Tucker Miller, Drew
5/7/2013 – Corn: have finally finished planting corn. Corn ranges from 2 collars to 7 collared leaves. Overall corn crop is very ragged looking. We went with some stands that we’re less than optimal. Heavy rains have also delayed fertilizer and herbicide applications. Have seed a few stink bug hits, but have only sprayed a few edges next to woods and bayous. Have had 5.2 inches of rain in May.
Wheat: all the wheat is heading. All our wheat received a fungicide. We sprayed for stripe rust early, and put out a head scab application on some later maturing wheat on our north end at Como. No problems with army worms, and only a few rice stink bugs . Too much rain to expect a big crop.
Cotton: started planting cotton last Saturday in April. Planted for a few days, then got 3 plus inches of rain, and 40 degree nights. Some cotton was up yesterday, but looked rough. Should know if it will survive by end of the week.
Soybeans: have a few beans up. Most beans are still in the bag. The ones that are up are at the unifoliate stage. No insect pressure. Deer eating some on the edges of wooded areas. In a rush to plant, a lot of producers did not apply a residual pre emerge. We may have a challenge cleaning up the crop if it continues to rain.
Peanuts: no peanuts planted yet.

Photo’s below from Tucker Miller of seedling cotton and stink bug damage on corn leaf. Click on image to enlarge photo.

Reporting from East Mississippi is Homer Wilson, Fulton
4/25/13 – Cold and wet. 2.35 inches of rain since 4/19/13, 35 degrees on 4/20, 37 degrees on 4/25, lots of frost damage on wheat. On 4/20, in my east region – could be 10% damage. Wheat looks very good – all had fungicide.
Maybe 75% of corn planted – about 40% of this is a stand. Lots of aphids on young corn and some cutworm sign in low spots. No spraying yet. Only about 50 acres of soybeans planted – none up. No cotton planted. We are behind – hope next week will be better.

Reporting from South Mississippi is Trey Bullock, Hattiesburg
4/25/13 – Corn is looking a little better this week. Corn is from V-4 to V-6. Rainfall this past Wednesday ranged from .7″ to 2″. Looks like growers will be able to get back in a few fields today (Friday) to hopefully finish side dressing corn.
Soil temps are surprisingly warm, with some fields reaching 72 degrees at 4 “. Problem is fields are still borderline wet to plant peanuts or cotton. Depending on rains this weekend, maybe we can start planting Monday. However, weather forecast is not looking good for next 7 days.
Wheat seems slow to progress in these cooler temps, but looking a lot better than I thought it would as fields mature. Have seen a few Fall Army worm egg masses in a few fields this week.
Hope everyone has a great DRY weekend.

Reporting from the South Delta is Bruce Pittman, Coila
4/26/13 – Received ½” – ¾” of rain this week. Farmers trying to straighten out existing corn crop but corn planting may have come to an end on any new acres. Start planting soybeans when it dries up.

Reporting from the North Delta is Justin George, Merigold
4/26/13 – Wednesday morning’s rain further delayed planting in Sunflower County. From Hwy 49 it looks like only 5% of the acres are planted. Coahoma County was able to keep rolling thru today. Corn planting continued thru today. In the first planted corn, starter fertilized corn is starting to show out and we are knifing, plowing and spraying herbicide where dry. Replant corn from last week is starting to emerge and was sprayed with Gramoxone to kill first planted. Disease in wheat has really slowed down. Rice is emerging and doing well. Flying out ammonium sulfate on the first planted rice that went in the ground around March 19.

Tucker Miller, Drew, sent these photos of sun scald on corn leaves and a common issue in corn fields throughout the state this year, delayed emergence, resulting in an uneven stand. (Click on photo to enlarge)