For this week’s video, we have the pleasure of visiting with Dr. Brian Pieralisi.  Brian serves as the Cotton Specialist with Mississippi State University.  Dr. Pieralisi joined Mississippi State roughly a year ago; prior to starting his current position, Brian was a cotton producer himself.  He completed his graduate work with Dr. Bobby Golden.

Brian sat down with me a few weeks back to discuss plant growth management.  He covers the basics of plant growth management in this video and we discuss some of the questions we are currently asked late in the year pertaining to PGRs- particularly when plant growth has become extremely aggressive.  I’m happy to have Dr. Pieralisi as a colleague and really appreciate his presentation.  You can watch his presentation below or by clicking here.  Brian is also on Twitter- @BPieralisi 

Our fifth presentation for the 2021 Cotton Focus Video Series is our own Dr. Aaron Smith, Extension Economist in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics.  Dr. Smith has recorded a presentation covering the 2021 Cotton Outlook.  I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this presentation and I believe you will gain a great deal from his insight.

Dr. Smith is a regular at our Cotton Focus events and I am extremely grateful to have his participation this year and his engagement with the cotton industry- we are extremely fortunate to have him in Tennessee.  Special thanks to Dr. Smith for recording this presentation.  You can watch his video by clicking here or in the video box below. 

The US Cotton Trust Protocol is a new program for US cotton that enables producers to measure their sustainability on the farm and transfer that information down the supply chain, ultimately to the brands and retailers. Because consumers are demanding more traceability, this platform enables US cotton growers greater market access.

In this week’s Cotton Focus video, Dr. Lori Duncan, Crop Sustainability Specialist, gives a brief overview of the need for the Trust Protocol and the enrollment process. Mr. John Lindamood, a cotton grower from Tiptonville and a leader in the cotton industry, joined Dr. Duncan in a virtual visit to discuss his viewpoint as a participant in the Trust Protocol. In this conversation, he details the need he sees for this new program as well as his experience in the enrollment process. We very much appreciate Mr. Lindamood’s time and willingness to share his perspective and his leadership in this new program.  We are also extremely grateful for Dr. Duncan and her continuous support of cotton producers both within and beyond the state of Tennessee.

You can access the video by clicking here or the link below.

I’m extremely excited to introduce the presenter for our third segment of the 2021 Cotton Focus Video Series- Dr. Bob Kemerait, Professor and Extension Specialist for the Department of Plant Pathology at the University of Georgia.  Dr. Kemerait’s program covers corn, cotton, peanuts and soybeans for the state of Georgia. As many of you know, Georgia cotton growers are faced with big challenges every year, including boll rot, Bacterial blight, Cotton leafroll dwarf virus, Fusarium wilt, nematodes, Target spot, Areolate mildew and seedling diseases.  Dr. Kemerait’s program guides his growers through each of these challenges.  While we face our own unique challenges, I always find it beneficial to learn about challenges faced by other regions and I believe understanding these issues from other perspectives makes us better at producing within our own environment.

On behalf of Dr. Heather Kelly and myself, special thanks to Dr. Kemerait for taking the time out of his extremely busy schedule to deliver this presentation.  I should also add, Dr. Kemerait is on Twitter.  I thoroughly enjoy following his profile- his posts are very informative and often entertaining; who else do you know that has video of a turtle eating a cotton plant?  You can find his profile here.

Dr. Kemerait’s presentation is linked below:

Again, thank you Dr. Kemerait!

Our second series of presentations for the 2021 Cotton Focus Video Series are from Dr. Larry Steckel’s program.  Dr. Steckel and his PhD student, Clay Perkins, will be presenting  two topics for us- the first is ‘Grass Management in Xtend and Enlist Cotton’ and the second is ‘Characterization and Management of Glyphosate-Resistant Junglerice’.  We are extremely blessed to have Dr. Steckel in Tennessee and I’m excited to have these two very important topics covered, especially after the challenges we’ve faced with grasses in recent years.

You can find links to Dr. Steckel’s and Mr. Perkins’ presentations below.

To kick off the 2021 Cotton Focus Video Series, we are extremely grateful to have two videos from Dr. Scott Stewart- one discussing updates on thrips and one discussing updates bollworms.  As many of you know, Dr. Scott Stewart has recently accepted a new role as the Director of the West Tennessee Research and Education Center.   While we all hate to see him leave his current position, we are definitely excited to have him remaining on the team and I am very thankful he was willing to take time out of his busy schedule to still develop and deliver this content!  Dr. Stewart has also recorded a presentation on plant bugs; we will be posting that a little later in this series.

You can find links to Dr. Stewart’s updates on thrips and bollworms below.

There are two VIRTUAL county meetings coming up next week that many of you may be interested in attending.

January 12, 2021: The Fayette and Hardeman County Extension Offices will be hosting a Winter Production meeting. This meeting will be held on Zoom live, and recorded starting at 9:00 a.m. The following specialists will be speaking at this meeting:  Dr. Larry Steckel, UT Weed Specialist, Dr. Tyson Raper, UT Cotton and Small Grains Specialist, and Ryan Blair, Extension Area Specialist with Grain & Cotton Variety Testing. Dicamba and Paraquat training meetings via Zoom will be scheduled later. For more information including the ZOOM meeting link, contact Jeff Via at (901) 465-5233 jvia@utk.edu.

January 14, 2021: The Tipton County Extension Office will be hosting a Winter Production meeting. This meeting will be held on Zoom live, and recorded starting at 9:00 a.m. The following specialists will be speaking at this meeting: Dr. Larry Steckel, UT Weed Specialist, Dr. Tyson Raper, UT Cotton and Small Grains Specialist, and Ryan Blair, Extension Area Specialist with Grain & Cotton Variety Testing. Dicamba and Paraquat training meetings via Zoom will be scheduled later. For more information including the ZOOM meeting link, contact Becky Muller at (901) 619-3186 or rcherry1@utk.edu.