Integrated Pest Management Extension Agent for Hockley and Cochran County,Kerry Siders, expressed the importance of moisture in the soil for farmers and producers as well as homeowners.
“It is pretty quite out there right now in terms of field work,” Siders said. “There have been some occasional activity, some deep plowing, trying to stop some field that are barren that did not have some kind of winter cover, they may have done some tillage to roughen it up to keep that sand from blowing.”
Siders explained that every time farmers till the ground it dries out the soil that much more. The small amount of moisture in the soil can be lost if it is over tilled.
“There will be some that start pre-irrigation over the next 30 days,” Siders said. “There’s some that have probably already starting a little bit of that where they try to store some moisture in the soil profile.”
With ongoing drought conditions, farmers are trying to keep moisture in the soil in different ways. Tilling the ground will bring sand to the surface and mix with the clay in the soil aiding in lessening high winds blowing the soil. This retains water by keeping the soil in place.
“Very few have the luxury though now of having that kind of water,” Siders said. “Especially not knowing if we’re gonna have another repeat of last year. Right now, we’re still classed in a drought.”
Winter plants or field coverage also need water to keep the plants alive not just for the upcoming growing season.
“It needs a drink to keep it alive,” Siders said. “I mean it’s struggling and of course there may be some producers that are interested in taking some of that wheat to grain and harvesting the grain and not even planting a cotton crop.”
Siders believes most producers are going to plant a high percentage of cotton, but there is the possibility of farmers plants peanuts, grains and corn. While it is not common for large snowfall this late in the season, there is still the possibility of cold snaps.
“We’re on the back side obviously. The potential for several hours below freezing become less and less as you get into March,” Siders said. “We’re going to see potentially some freezing weather or slightly below that. It’s not unusual to get a cold snap. That’s why we don’t get too anxious to plant even gardens or annual flowers and too much landscape because it can be nipped by a freezing night.”
Siders believes the area is on the back side of the freezing temperatures, snow and ice, but is open to any form of moisture.
“We’ll take moisture in any form, we had a foggy morning, and it was almost like a really light drizzle,” Siders said. “Now that doesn’t add up to a lot of moisture but anytime you put humidity into the air you don’t lose moisture either.”
When homeowners do not receive measurable rain for more than 30 days, Siders encourages watering the trees in their yards or near their homes.
“These deciduous trees that are old and took a long time to develop and are very expensive and have a lot of value to the landscape,” Siders said. “We gotta water those. We gotta drop the garden hose at those trees and water because it can cut the life span down considerably if we don’t supplement the water.”
At the same time Siders expresses the importance of being careful with water resources.
“We also have to be careful with our water resources,” Siders said. “Especially folks in town we don’t want to get ourselves in a bind and not have that water available for drinking water either.”
Siders explained that farmers producing wheat should be looking for army cut worms in their soil as temperatures rise.
“It’s a larva pest that feeds at the crown and will eventually feed on the leaves as the wheat plant develops,” Siders said. “That usually happens now as the temperatures start rising above 50 degrees or nighttime temperatures warm up and we get longer days.”
If producers find more than four per square foot, they should contact Siders or an agricultural chemical expert to talk about the steps they can take to get rid of the pest.