Andy Tonos, Greenville
6/20/2023 – Corn ranges anywhere from just now tasseling to brown silk. The earliest corn pollination was pretty good despite the heat – not 100%, but close. All has been irrigated once or twice before the rains set in. Most of my areas went close to a month with zero rain. Light hail damage on some of mine but others not so fortunate.
Soybeans are anywhere from R1 to R4, with the average being around R2-R3. Very little insect pressure so far. Weed control good until we got to June – then had trouble killing weeds, mostly grasses. A good bit of hail damage but none that will be yield reducing for the most part. Again, others not so lucky.
This is the least rice acres I’ve had in 20 years but what I do have, the oldest is close to mid-season and the youngest just now flooded up. Weed control was hit or miss due to various reasons – mostly dry conditions prior to flood and water management.
Jim Arrington, Senatobia
6/23/2023 – Corn: Most beginning to tassel. We’ve had plenty of rain so far, but a few pivots have started this week so as not to get behind. If forecasted temps for next week are correct, we will have lots of water going out.
Soybeans: Very quiet so far on the insect front. Some wheat beans still to plant up to R3. We have a pretty clean crop with the exception of places that have been too wet to get to and it will be a battle to clean those up.
Cotton: Found a bloom this week in cotton that was planted way too early and somehow survived the 40-degree nights we had. Plant bug counts have not been high although steady. We have sprayed most every acre once and some older twice. We have not had any spider mites so far. The vast majority of what I’m checking was planted in a pretty short window. We went from being on the sidelines one day to full steam ahead the next. So, when it ends, I assume it will be the same only in reverse. We’ve seen more hail damage on cotton this year than the last 20 yrs. combined. Haven’t lost a stand anywhere but banged up pretty bad in spots.
Lauren Green, Greenwood
6/15/2023 – We got a much-needed rain in my area this past week. Corn ranges from V8 to R2. Should finish up fertilizer tassel shot by first of next week. Have not seen any disease to speak of so far. Soybeans are from still waiting to have wheat cut up to full R2. We did have to water some earlier ones but held off on the younger ones. Little to no insect pressure to date. We will be looking at a fungicide application in next 7-10 days on older soybeans. Wheat harvest is almost over and yields have been good. Overall quality and test weight were good. Cotton is from 6 node up to 11 nodes. Had to battle thrips this year in almost every field. Several fields required two applications to get to 4th node. Also getting influx of plant bugs where we seem to have problems every year. Started to pick up few nymphs this week and have started to treat them. Spider mites were beginning to show up and seems rain has slowed them down for few days.
Dee Boykin, Yazoo City
6/19/2023 – Our corn is from tassel (VT) to soft dough (R4.1) with very good moisture everywhere and disease incidence is very low at this point. We’re seeing some drought induced nutrient deficiencies that are visible but have been corrected by rain in dryland fields. Overall, the corn crop looks very good but was a little questionable a week ago. Hopefully we’ll have favorable weather to finish it.
Soybeans are all in the reproductive stages with most between R3 and R5. Weeds are under control in most fields and insects are pretty much nonexistent so far. We’re enjoying the rainfall but have a ways to go.
Cotton appears to be the stepchild crop again. Even the old diehards (I can say that because I’m one) are planting much fewer acres. Maybe someday the people influencing that decline will understand the grower has to show a profit to remain in business. Having gotten that off my mind, I’ll say that we’re off to a good start with the few acres that have been dedicated to cotton. Most is squaring now; plant bug pressure is fairly light so far. Weeds are under control, with a few exceptions, and the weather forecast promises an opportunity to clean up the acres that need attention. Here again, the crop has a ways to go.
Tim Richards, Yazoo City
6/21/2023 – The cotton crops in our area are all across the board as far as plant stage. Oldest cotton is 13 nodes and youngest is 6 nodes with quite a few acres with seeds that just came up and cotton in the same field might be 6-7 nodes due to planting into grown up seed beds that dried out. We had about 4 windows to get it planted. We were able to get by without spraying the oldest cotton for thrips but after that planting thrips got heavy and have been ever since. Used Intrepid Edge on about 80% of what we treated for thrips with good results. This week we’ve started treating adult TPB. Treated spider mites on several hundred acres of cotton that has had nothing on it to flare mites (using Zeal Pro). Have at least 1000 acres in Sharkey and Issaquena counties that were sand blasted in 4th-6th node that had gotten past thrips stage but due to the damage and thrips numbers had to treat again. To say that our cotton crop down here is uniform would be like saying black is white.
Soybeans luckily were all planted in a timely manner and to date have not had any problems. We have found no bollworm so far and 1 red banded stink bug total for the season. I feel like due to their age we’ll miss having to spray for bollworm.
Billy Bryant, Greenwood
6/21/2023 – Cotton: Exodus of plant bugs from corn to cotton has begun with high numbers coming off the older corn this week. Have begun aggressive treatments of trim passes along field borders next to corn. Went around with imidacloprid on squaring cotton last week. Also made the first mepichlor treatments last week starting with the 2127 and 5091. Have not applied mepichlor to other varieties yet but will by later this week. Rains last week followed by days of full sun this week allowing for good steady growth. Will have planes in the air over the next few days applying plant bug round 2.
Soybeans: Septoria Brown Spot has been active in the beans following 2022 beans. I see no other disease at this time. Insect activity has been very low with the exception of stinkbugs around field borders. Many fields have reached late R3 to early R4 now and I have begun to make fungicide treatments. No bollworms yet to speak of – just a few of various ages during the day picked up in the sweep net.
Following photos from Jeff North:
Ethan Willers, Mantee
6/22/2023 – As of right now, most fields in our area have received a much-needed rain. Some are on the wet side; still a few need more. We have had some hail and some fields got notable leaf loss, but thankfully we have not had any devastating hail like other areas.
Corn is looking good. At this point I don’t think we have had the nitrogen loss from spring rains that we have seen in the past few years. Crop development ranges from just prior to tassel, out to solid R2. Pollination looks good so far. Disease pressure looks really light as of this week.
Soybeans stages vary greatly as usual. Some late beans are just coming up, and the oldest are really close to R3, with the bulk of them R2-3. Stink bug numbers have been up a bit for R2-3 beans, some fields running 2-4/25 in areas. Looking like they might end up building, we will watch that for a while. This week I noticed several fields with a decent amount of aerial web blight. Seems a little early in the crop development for that, but it could be the stress the crop was in for moisture the last few weeks has made it a little more susceptible to diseases.
Cotton looks good so far, 4 leaf to 9th leaf. Plant bugs are picking up and a few will get sprayed this week.
Sweet potato’s look pretty good for the most part. A few fields that were set with marginal moisture and still have not had a good rain look pretty rough. Hopefully they can catch a shower and come on out okay. Granulate cutworms showed up in numbers on a few places last week. Besiege took care of those. Flea beetle number really jumped this week and we are taking those back down with bifenthrin, tagged along with the Dual behind the cultivators. Yellow stripe armyworms had a judge hatch out across a wide geography. We will watch those close for now.
Bert Falkner, West Point
6/22/2023 – I have never seen a weather pattern like we’re in now; 90 degrees in February and at mid-afternoon in June, it’s 81 degrees! We’ve had a lot of rain in the last 10 days – up to 5” in areas, along with record size hail (via news). I have never seen hail damage as wide spread as we received a week ago. Acres of corn and cotton was devastated. Corn in tassel growth stage, now shredded and 8-node cotton was left with nothing but a 6” stalk standing. This was not isolated – it was wide spread.
Late cotton is 2-4 nodes but most is at 8-12 nodes. We’re pixing heavily and treating for plant bugs; some areas with high numbers have had 2 plant bug applications 7-days apart. Overall, plant bugs numbers do not seem to be in as high as in the past. Fruit set in cotton is okay. Most cotton cleaned up and hopefully, layed-by.
Wheat soybeans are just emerging and we’ll start herbicide in these beans next week. Most beans are R1-R3 growth stage and layed by. Overall, we’re clean as herbicides did a good job. No insect issues so far.
Most corn is in all stages of pollination up to roasting ear growth stage. Growers are running nitrogen through pivots, where possible. Insects have not been an issue other than corn earworm feeding in ear tips. On the next full moon, we should be ready for moths coming out of corn.
Peanuts are up to 45 days old. All twin rows have lapped or basically lapped; the oldest peanuts middles are about 12” from lapping. Working on getting all layed-by and hoping for a shower to activate herbicides. Will be thinking about our first soil fungicides in about 10 days. Thrips material at planting held back thrips and other insects up to now.
The weather we are having is grain growing weather!!
Trey Bullock, Seminary
6/20/2023 – Most counties are extremely wet with exception of just South of Hattiesburg down to Hancock co near the coast.
Cotton is from in the sack to 12 nodes. Rains have been kinda relentless for the past 7-10 days in some counties. Insects have been relatively low. Aphids were blowing up in fields along MS river last week but rains hopefully helped this a little. Growers haven’t been able to get in fields for 7-10 days so fields have grown up and fields are in much need of growth regulators. Lots of field have hail damage to some extent with some being extreme.