"Larry Caldwell" wrote in message
...
(Gordon Couger) writes:

I know both farmers that from our land grip about the price but won't
buy
anything but GM cotton seed. Both are planing substantial no till cotton
this year. Not only for the cost reductions but to stop erosion and
build
organic matter in the soil. The farmer on my home place is very good on
legume rotations keeping about a third of the place in at any one time.

It sounds like your tenant is a good farmer. Take care of the land and
it will take care of you.

What kind of legumes does he plant? Up until they banned DDT, my dad
used to raise hairy vetch for seed (in the PNW). I always heard it was
used as a cover crop in the south, but never knew exactly how. After the
DDT ban, the germination dropped off too much to make it a viable crop.
It has an extended blossom period and needs a really persistent pesticide
to kill the fly that stings the blossom. It was a wonderful rotation
crop that put a lot of nitrogen and humus in the soil. The only way to
raise it now is by repeated spraying of insecticide throughout the
blossom phase, which lasts for weeks. It doesn't pay.

If they GM a strain of vetch with an insecticide that would kill the fly
larvae, it could return as a viable rotation crop.

He plants alfalfa taking care of the ground is secondary to it being the
best cash crop he has. He is geared up to put up 4 x 4 x 8 foot bales and
the machinery and trucks to haul them and deliver them to diaries. We also
have the right kind of weather to seed alfalfa. It will make as much as 4
bushels an acre at 60 cents to $2.00 a pound for the newest certified
varieties.

He is also very good about taking care of the ground. It has to make him a
living the rest of his life. He is going no till on cotton this year and
that will help as well.

If I can convince my brother to drill enough little wells to put in a center
pivot and take dry weather out of the equation it should really do well. He
thinks we need more water than I do. It would be nice to have enough water
to make 4 bale cotton but enough to insure 1 bale cotton will work and if
you keep it half in cotton and half in hay you can make a lot of hay early
and 2 or 3 bale cotton with 250 GPM. The cotton won't need water before the
middle of June a the earliest and most of the time the first of July. You
can get 2 good cuttings of hay and have a third half way there by the time
you need water on the cotton.

I can barely remember when they used vetch as a cover crop and mixed it with
tame pasture. It makes a pretty bad weed on some ground down here if you let
it go to seed. It works well in a pasture mix but it is real expensive.

Can't you use a systemic insecticide like Cygon on Disyston to give long
term control. At the price it is down here it would be a real good crop or
do you need a contact insecticide?

There should be a BT protien that would kill them. I don't think vetch is
high on the list of things to do for them. There are lot of things that will
make more money ahead of you in line and at the rate we are approving things
it is way too slow.

Gordon