San Patricio Agriculture

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1 San Patricio Agriculture Agriculture Affects Everyone Inside this issue: Cotton 2 Corn 3 Direct Payments 4 Palmer Amaranth Resistance 4 Grassfed Beef Conference 5 SPCC Program 6 Webinar: Grazing Management for Livestock Webinar February 7, :00 pm - 1:00 pm 1 General CEU offered $10 payable on the website No charge to participate in the webinar LIST: The Extension Office is updating our list. If you would like to be added to our list, please call the Extension Office or at sanpatri@ag.tamu.edu. Educational programs of the Texas AgriLife Extension Service are open to all people without regard to race, color, sex, disability, religion, age, or national origin. The Texas A&M University System, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the County Commissioners Courts of Texas Cooperating February, 2013 Good job San Patricio County! From my perspective, all the volunteers who worked and supported the 2013 A&H Show should pat yourselves on the back. The show ran like a well oiled machine and I was excited to be apart of a team of people who truly care about the advancement of our youth. As we start a new year, the lack of rain and our dry soil profile, is still of great concern. The National Weather Service still maintains we are in a neutral weather cycle, Interpretation: 33% chance below normal rainfall, 33% average rainfall, 33 % chance above normal rainfall through the spring. NWS also stated the summer months are not predictable due to variable tropical activity. Interpretation: keep paying the preacher. I was reading the Cattle Fax, Long Term Outlook Special Edition, December 2012 and was interested in several aspects of the report and would like to pass along some of the information. Cattle Fax estimates for 2013 fed steer prices between $1.47-$1.79, 750 lb steers $1.47- $1.79, 550 lb steers $1.70-$2.05, utility cow $.74-$1.03, bred females are $1550 and corn trading on the board $5.50/bu-$7.85/bu. Also, beef cows estimated at 29.5 million head down 1% form 2012, and if you account for 2013 will be a decline 15 of the last 17 years. Cattle Fax went further as to say, considering certain supply and demand factors, the cattle industry would need to grow the US cattle herd 2-3 million in 10 years. Ironically, that amount of growth would only put the total cow inventory back to the of 32 million head. Several programs are already scheduled for the year and for your planning purposes, would like to share those programs and dates: April 10 Marketing Program Dr Mark Welch Civic Center, Sinton Volume 2, Issue 1 April 24 Coastal Bend Grain Storage & Handlers Safety Conference Civic Center, Sinton May 24 Brush & Pond Management Field Day Welder Wildlife June 6 San Patricio Crop Tour June US Ag Recycling Plastic Container Collection October 2-3 Farm Show Robstown October 25 CEU Conference Location TBD December 10 Beef Field Day Location TBD I also, again, would like to urge you to bring any type of program you feel would be beneficial to the constituents of this county to my attention. I do want and need your input. Thanks, San Patricio Agriculture Agriculture Affects Everyone 1

2 Large cotton supplies, weather will weigh heavily in 2013 COLLEGE STATION Recordhigh carryover stocks of cotton and future weather patterns are just a few factors affecting cotton prices heading into 2013, according to a Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service economist. We will see a cutback in Texas cotton acreage as farmers take advantage of strong corn, wheat and sorghum prices, said Dr. John Robinson, AgriLife Extension cotton economist in College Station. Robinson said cotton prices are still adjusting to historic prices in when $2-plus per pound cotton prices led to higher world production and reduced consumption. That set of circumstances led to recordhigh carryover stocks of cotton worldwide and weaker prices. Texas cotton farmers will likely switch some acreage to grain crops to take advantage of high prices in 2013, according to Dr. John Robinson, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service cotton economist in College Station. (Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service photo by Blair Fannin) Robinson said China accounts for about half of the world s carryover stocks, and most of those are held off the shelf in government reserve, he said. The combination of these bearish fundamentals and policy uncertainty sets the stage for what we may see in 2013, he said. We can certainly expect significant reductions in cotton acreage, starting with Australia, Brazil and Argentina last month. With the strength in 2013 corn, soybean and wheat future prices, Robinson said there will likely be major shifts to grains and oilseeds in the Midsouth and Southeast. He projects if U.S. cotton planted dips to 8.9 million acres, We could still see 14 million bales of production. I would project a likely range of December 2013 prices at 65 to 85 cents per pound, he said. The upshot is that the insurance base price established in early 2013 will likely be in the 70 cent range far, far lower than in the previous two years. The continuation of the sovereign debt issues in Europe or fiscal cliff fears in the U.S. will only reinforce negative to slow economic growth in 2013, he said. That suggests little room for a demand-driven rally in cotton prices, Robinson said. In addition, if some major cottonproducing country has a production disaster, the market shock could easily be squelched by China simply releasing some of their government reserve stocks. In short, weak demand and policy distortion will likely keep the upside capped and the downside open. San Patricio Agriculture Agriculture Affects Everyone 2

3 AgriLife Research expert: Drought-tolerant corn advances beginning to show AMARILLO There s nothing like a couple years of drought to help determine the advances being made in drought-tolerant corn. And Dr. Qingwu Xue, a Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientist, says there are some significant differences starting to show up. Xue, AgriLife Research crop stress physiologist in Amarillo, said drought and water issues have been very relevant in the last two years, especially the historic drought for Texas in 2011 and for the Corn Belt in Some of the drought-tolerant corn hybrids introduced since 2011 include: AquaMax by Pioneer, AgriSure Artesian by Syngenta and DroughtGard by Monsanto. The question is, how have these drought-tolerant hybrids performed in our environment in the Texas Panhandle? Xue said. Xue and his team have been evaluating these drought-tolerant corn hybrids at the North Plains Research Field near Etter for the past two years. The hybrids were grown at three populations and at three irrigation levels, from full irrigation to limited irrigation The irrigation levels were 100 percent evapotranspiration, 75 percent and 50 percent, he said. Evapotranspiration is the amount of water lost from plant transpiration and soil evaporation. The purpose of irrigation is to apply water to meet a plant s evapotranspiration demand. With less than 6 inches of effective rainfall during the 2012 corn season, the irrigation for 100 percent, 75 percent and 50 percent evapotranspiration was 24 inches, 18 inches and 13 inches, respectively, Xue said. Under these conditions, the corn yields were bushels per acre for 100 percent level, bushels per acre for the 75 percent level and bushels per acre for the 50 percent level. At the full irrigation level, drought-tolerant hybrids hardly showed any yield gain as compared to the check hybrids, Xue said. However, the drought-tolerant hybrids showed yield increases of up to 20 bushels per acre at 75 percent and 50 percent evapotranspiration levels over the check, depending on hybrid and population. One of the most significant things he said they saw during the trials was better kernel set among the drought-tolerant corn compared to check hybrids. This could be, in part, due to the hybrids reaching moisture deep in the soil and developing root systems that go down deeper than the traditional hybrids. Another possibility is that the drought-tolerant hybrids may have ability to conserve water by rolling the leaves during dry and hot periods, Xue said. He and his team will work to better understand the physiological mechanisms for higher yields in these droughttolerant hybrids as their research continues. We clearly saw some yield benefits of the drought-tolerant hybrids at reduced irrigation levels as the drought-tolerant hybrids really did well exerting silks, even during very harsh conditions dry and hot at the same time tassels were shedding pollen. Xue said he has not conducted any economic analysis for these trials. It will be up to the producer to determine if he can ever afford a 100-bushel-per-acre corn yield level or not, he said. But certainly, if we are talking about limited irrigation in the future, drought-tolerant corn may fit into producers choices. Xue said in terms of irrigation water savings, 75 percent evapotranspiration may be the most attractive because the yield only dropped about 15 percent, but irrigation water was reduced by 25 percent or 6 inches of water savings. San Patricio Agriculture Agriculture Affects Everyone 3

4 USDA Announces 2013 Sign-up for Direct Payments and ACRE Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced that sign-up for farm programs extended from the 2008 farm bill, including direct payments, will begin on Feb. 19. The one-year extension of the 2008 farm bill will feature several programs, including: the Direct and Counter-Cyclical Payment Program (DCP), and the Average Crop Revenue Election Program (ACRE). Sign-ups for DCP and ACRE for the 2013 crops begin on Feb. 19, The DCP sign-up period will end on Aug. 2, 2013, and the ACRE sign-up period will end on June 3, 2013 Program provisions for DCP and ACRE are unchanged from 2012, except that all eligible participants in 2013 may choose to enroll in either DCP or ACRE for the 2013 crop year. Meaning eligible producers who were enrolled in ACRE in 2012 may elect to enroll in DCP in 2013 or may re-enroll in ACRE in 2013 (and vice versa). For more information about program requirements, updates and signups, visit any FSA county office or Palmer amaranth resistance spreads in Texas High Plains from Harry Cline with Southwest Farm Press, Jan. 10 Glyphosate-resistant palmer amaranth was identified in seven West Texas High Plains counties along the New Mexico border last cotton growing season, up from one county the year before, reports Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service weed specialist Paul Baumann. Baumann said this rapid spread in West Texas is mirrored by a large area in Central Texas stretching from Hill and Ellis counties to the upper Texas Gulf Coast through Southeast Texas where glyphosateresistant common water hemp or careless weed has been identified. Baumann reported on these two "alarming" issues at the recent Beltwide Cotton Conference in San Antonio, where he told growers and others that the "horror stories" of pigweed resistance need not be repeated in Texas with a proactive approach to weed management. Glyphosate-resistance is showing up in Roundup Ready crops where certain biotypes are resistant to the herbicide. Careless weed resistance was first identified in 2005 with spotty infestations along the Gulf Coast, and then it was hit or miss until 2010, with it occurring in other sites, he said. "If all else is killed out but that one plant is different, that is the start of the problem," he said. However, it may not be a particularly new problem by the time it becomes visually obvious. A grower could treat herbicide resistant plants several times before he realizes they are not dying because of resistance. Making the problem worse is that pigweed can shed 400,000 or more seeds. "So if that one weed is not killed, then later that year or the following year, there may be a whole patch of this resistant biotype of the weed." Glyphosate-resistant Palmer amaranth was first confirmed in Terry county a year ago. Last season it was identified in surrounding counties-hale, Hockley and Bailey. San Patricio Agriculture Agriculture Affects Everyone 4

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8 Nonprofit Organization US Postage PAID Bobby R. McCool San Patricio County Extension Agent Agriculture/Natural Resources 219 N. Vineyard Sinton, TX Permit No.115 Visit us online! Disclaimer - the information herein is for informational purposes only. Reference to commercial products or trade names is made with the understanding that no discrimination is intended and no endorsement by the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension is implied. Educational programs of the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension are open to all citizens without regard to race, color, sex, disability, religion, age or national origin. Individuals with disabilities who require an auxiliary aid, service, or accommodation in order to participate in any Extension event are encouraged to contact their County Extension Office at at least one week in advance of the program in order for proper arrangements to be made. In the event of a name, address or phone number change please contact the office at: Texas AgriLife Extension Service 219 N. Vineyard Attn: Ag/NR Sinton, Texas (361) Bobby R. McCool County Extension Agent Agriculture/Natural Resources Texas AgriLife Extension Service, San Patricio County San Patricio Agriculture Agriculture Affects Everyone 8