Don't buy and apply unnecessary fertilizer. And be sure to credit residual soil nitrates against the crop's nitrogen requirement. Don't apply more nitrogen than the crop needs. Furrow diking, using a cover crop such as wheat during the fallow winter season, or practicing minimum tillage in dryland fields are good individual practices to conserve soil moisture, improve yields and boost returns per acre, the agronomist said. Take a good look at your seeding rate, too.
Higher rates mean higher cost.
If you are seeding more than 20 pounds per acre, think about cutting back. Cotton seeded at 15 pounds per acre returned the best yields in our 1998 seeding rate field trial in Swisher County. Boman also encourage producers to plant at least two or more adapted cotton varieties and to make objective performance comparisons when selecting varieties to plant.