Thank you to all of our Industry Partners, County Agents and Producers who participate in our County Standardized Trials programs
Below are the results from this year’s CST Wheat trials
All variety testing data can be found at http://search.utcrops.com
The last week of June and the start of July have brought unusually dry conditions to much of West Tennessee, and we’re already seeing the effects on the region’s major row crops. Among crops cotton—often considered a heat-loving crop—may appear to be thriving right now, extended heat and limited rainfall can still influence how cotton and other major crops grow and develop as the season progresses.
Why this matters now
Dry weather at this point in the season can quickly shift from “manageable” to “yield-limiting,” especially if high temperature and evaporative demand rates continue and soil water remains low. A widespread, soaking rain in the coming weeks would help stabilize crop conditions and reduce stress during critical growth periods.
What this blog covers
This article focuses on: Continue reading
Another week and more reports and field visits to fields where Palmer amaranth is escaping glufosinate, glyphosate and dicamba. These escapes range from relatively small pockets in fields to almost complete Palmer amaranth jail breaks across large portions of fields (Picture 1 and 2). Continue reading
Tarnished plant bug numbers appear to be low thus far in 2026 and clouded plant bugs are non-existent. Crop age and what’s neighboring your cotton play a large part of how intense plant bug pressure is over time. That being said, keeping an eye on square retention is the best gauge to determine how well your insecticides are performing. Most I’ve talked to haven’t applied Diamond yet or have it queued up for their next application. Diamond shines when you catch early plant bug hatches often after large adult migrations during late squaring and we see a good ROI with Diamond around that 1st week of bloom timing. Continue reading
I’ve gotten a few questions on Kudzu bugs over the past few days. Early planted beans (R3 +) are driving these calls and adult migration into more mature soybeans is common. With the mild winter and early spring, this migration is sooner than we’ve seen in the past. Continue reading
There have been too many reports of Palmer amaranth escaping multiple applications of dicamba, Liberty and/or dicamba tankmixed with Liberty. Of course, we all have known for sometime that we have an ever-spreading biotype of dicamba-resistant Palmer amaranth in West Tennessee. Liberty on the other hand has been much more consistent controlling pigweed. Until it wasn’t. Continue reading
All the frequent rain lately has made it difficult to spray fields timely. This has left some cotton fields with large goosegrass and Palmer amaranth. The typical post application to control both those weeds is a tankmix of Liberty and clethodim. This tankmix will typically provide fair control of large goosegrass. However, we have found some goosegrass populations where that tankmix is not very effective. Palmer amaranth too often will recover. In those cases, hooded or post-direct applications should be considered. Continue reading
There have been a good number of reports of prickly sida issues in soybean and cotton fields. Prickly sida or tea weed has increasingly become more of an issue in these crops. There are two reasons for this. First, the Group 15 herbicides (Dual Mag, Warrant, Zidua) are the most common PRE-applied herbicides utilized. Though that group of herbicides provides good residual control of pigweed and grasses, it provides no help on sida. Second, is that neither glyphosate nor dicamba has ever been very effective on this weed. The only popular POST option that can give some control is Liberty. However, even Liberty is limited to controlling only very small (<2”) prickly sida. Continue reading
