High Cotton Award winner, Doug Scott, faced weather related challenges in 2021.
Despite running cotton pickers in the mud, Doug Scott says 2020 turned out a decent harvest for his cotton crop outside of Sikeston, Mo.
When he spoke with Farm Press during harvest, he mentioned that even though he caught a good amount of moisture from several hurricanes out of the gulf, his crop was still picking well.
“First off, no one wants to hear you complain about it,” Scott said. “It is what it is and there’s a lot more people that have faced worse issues than what we have had. And with that, we’ve had a pretty decent crop, in fact a good crop.”
Robbins named 2021 High Cotton winner for the Southwest
Last fall, Robbie Robbins harvested his 62nd cotton crop. Five picker balers, accompanying equipment and employees converged on his Altus, Okla., farms to harvest 6,000 acres of cotton a stark contrast to the mules he worked as a young boy on the family farm or his first five-acre cotton crop produced as a junior in high school.
Robbins credits his success to soil tests, variety test plots, a good entomologist and irrigation. Early in his career, he said Extension agents played a major role. “They helped young farmers grow, learn and do better.”
Producers are urged to contact their county FSA office. There s probably not a more important time than right now for producers to take advantage of all the safety-net provisions available, says newly appointed Farm Service Agency Administrator Zach Ducheneaux in a phone interview with Farm Press regarding enrollment in the Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) or Price Loss Coverage (PLC) programs.
The enrollment deadline for the USDA programs is Monday, March 15, 2021. We ve still got a lot of economic uncertainty regarding what s going to happen as the pandemic hopefully winds down, but that could flare up at any point in time. The markets can be so volatile in times of economic uncertainty. These programs can help mitigate that impact.