Ag Fax: Rice
By Owen Taylor
AgFax
Hurricane Hannah put harvest on hold in coastal Texas and southwest Louisiana. Some rice went down and growers may have to rut up fields in places. But damage and disruptions were rather slight compared to the major toll the storm took on the cotton crop farther south along the Texas coast. For more information on that, connect to our Southwest Cotton newsletter in the Also of Note section.
Where harvest has restarted in the coastal belt, yields continue to be strong.
Draining has started in Arkansas on a very localized basis in rice flown on early in the planting season. A few more fields will likely be drained next week.
Ashley Peters, Peters Crop Consulting, Crowville, Louisiana
“Every other day it seems to rain somewhere, and more scattered showers fell yesterday (7/26). We have an 80% chance forecasted for tomorrow (7/29). Most of the crops are not in need of a rain at this point.
“We are making some stink bug applications in the oldest rice. We may be able to quit watering or drain some fields late this week or early next week. A lot of rice is heading now, so we are really watching for stink bugs and making applications where needed.
“Fungicide and fertilizer work are underway in the later-planted rice, and herbicides still may be going out in the absolute youngest rice, although that’s a very small part of our crop. The majority of our rice acres have headed or are close to it, and it’s all moving along fairly quickly. We’re probably 5 to 7 days away from draining the first field of paddy rice.
“We’re spraying some of the younger soybeans for bollworms, and we’re starting to treat more fields for redbanded stink bugs (RBSB). Redbanded numbers aren’t terribly high, but we’re dealing with them as they show up. We did do a lot of fungicide applications last week in the beans.
“One of my clients has started cutting corn, and a few more farmers in the area are cutting, too.”
Dustin Harrell, Louisiana Rice Extension Specialist, LSU Rice Research Station, Crowley
“The weather in southwest Louisiana has slowed down harvest a good bit. Over the last five days, we've been trying to cut rice between showers. But after today (7/29), the weather is supposed to clear up a little, and harvest should pick up again.
“We've harvested what we can, and yields have been very good this year. I'm still very impressed with how well some of our newer lines are doing, like the PVL02 and the CLL 17. The FullPage hybrids are performing nicely, too.
“We held our virtual row rice field day on Monday (7/27) and presentations are available online for viewing. The videos cover a wide range of topics related to production, including fertility, irrigation, weed control and pest management.”