Last Spray Decision 8-16-18 The easy call for ‘whether or not your cotton needs another spray or not’ is based on complete cutout. When your top piece of fruit is a boll, and there are not more squares in the top, then the crop is pretty safe. The other extreme would be the later cotton with 5 or 6 nodes above white bloom. This cotton probably needs another spray for sure. I think our biggest pest for cotton this year is and has been plant bugs. They are not everywhere but they are much more common than normal and our sprays have not lasted as long as we are used too. All of this is because of this abundant rain. Whenever it rains, it washes off a pyrethroid to reduce the lasting effect. Also, the plant bugs like this new growth coming out and they have higher reproductive capacity in wet conditions. Ultimately if it has been two weeks sense your last spray, I think the cotton that is still blooming heavy or has a good number of small bolls in the top is a candidate for another spray of Bifenthrin and add 8 ounces of Orthene if you have these extremely high plantbug numbers. The moth flight is down, and at this point, the only cotton I think could be an issue for using the Besiege/Prevathon for a second time is PHY 333/312 that has been 17 days sense the last spray AND has 3% worms or more under bloom tags AND has several nodes above white bloom with squares indicating it will bloom for another 2 weeks… basically late maturing 333. I believe if it is close to cutout, then only the plant bugs are a concern unless you find extremely high worm numbers indicating a hot spot. SUMMARY: Here are the borderline scenarios where cost of spraying is close yield benefit.
Any variety right at cutout with several small bolls at the top and maybe one square and very high bug numbers.(If insect numbers were just barely at threshold or lower, or if it has quit blooming, I would walk away from it)
PHY 333/312 with 3% worms but close to cutout or the last square is blooming this week, and also some plant bugs.This would be a pyrethroid only call and does not justify the expensive stuff.
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