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Oct. 30, 2001Treatments after harvest serve eradication purpose
(ABILENE) — The aerial applicator’s plane flies back and forth across a cotton field, a sight familiar to High Plains cotton producers who’ve long treated fields to control the damage from cotton pests.
What may not be familiar to many of these producers is the sight of an aerial applicator spraying insecticide on a recently harvested field.
Growers on the Plains have witnessed such a sight as boll weevil eradication applications continue across Texas, and they question the sense of treating harvested fields, said Charles Allen, program director for the Texas Boll Weevil Eradication Foundation.
But these treatments are critical for successful eradication, he said.
“Fall is a critical time of year for boll weevil eradication, Allen said. “Thorough treatment of fields in the fall provides maximum boll weevil suppression and is the quickest and most economical route to complete elimination of boll weevils from an area.”
Two new zones, Southern High Plains/Caprock and Northern High Plains, began eradication in September. These zones are undergoing diapause treatments, where all the cotton fields are sprayed weekly to drastically reduce the number of boll weevils that will overwinter and re-emerge during the next growing season.
In other Plains zones, which are completing their third year of eradication, fields are treated when weevils are caught in fields where food is present.
Ordinarily, growers would cease treating fields after harvest because spending the money on a harvested field would not make sense from an insect-control standpoint. The goal of control is to prevent significant economic damage to a crop.
However, “until a freeze kills the cotton stalks, they can support the regrowth of leaves, and more importantly, fruit that provide food for boll weevils,” Allen said.
When these conditions are present in the diapause phase of eradication, the fields need to be treated, he said.
“It’s easy to forget that the goal of treatment in eradication is not just protection of cotton yield but the complete elimination of the boll weevil,” Allen said. “With that goal in mind, it not only makes sense to treat harvested fields that have regrown to the point that they have produced boll weevil food, it is critical to the success of the program.”
Cotton producers may contact their district or zone offices for more information.
