Specialists Speaking- Tyson Raper
Tyson Raper
TENNESSEE
Our spring began far warmer than normal, with a mid-April planting window that enticed several into planting big portions of their cotton acres. The first of May brought what we are hoping will be our one-and-only blackberry winter for 2026; nighttime temperatures have occasionally dipped into the mid-40s, with a few daytime temps failing to break 70. Fortunately, those cool days have not been accompanied by excessive rainfall events for most.
As I write this in the second week of May, most everyone who has cotton yet to plant in the state is taking advantage of the current window. At the moment, a few are making replant decisions where large rainfall events, coupled with cool temperatures, caught cotton in the middle of emerging — or, “in the crook.” Some of our earliest planted cotton in those areas looks rough, but I’m generally leaning toward keeping the stand if it is relatively uniform (few large skips) and we have populations near 28,000.
The decision to keep gets easier as we get later in the month. By the time you read this, my threshold for keep versus replant leans very hard toward keep. I believe most will have wrapped up cotton planting in the coming days, but a few have mentioned following wheat with cotton. Management strategies shift in that scenario. For more information, check out our recent blog post on the topic at news.utcrops.com.
Tyson Raper
TENNESSEE
