The following projects received Cotton Foundation support in 2003-04. Other 2003-04 projects that received ongoing support are described in the 2004-05 project support section.
Expanding Kansas Cotton Production Research and Education Programs
The escalation in Kansas cotton production mandates the establishment of a quality research and education program that will provide useful, timely and profit generating information to cotton growers in this new cotton growing region.
Kansas State University researchers continue to train educators and expand their research and demonstration programs, including cotton seminars held at four sites in January of 2004. The Kansas State University Research & Extension Cotton program for 2004 also included a series of county variety, growth regulator and harvest preparation demonstrations, on-farm replicated population and insect control studies, and one replicated double-cropping study.
Their long-term objectives are to: 1) develop a base of cotton production oriented results applicable to the higher elevation cotton growing regions of Kansas and 2) develop and grow an infrastructure of information disseminators.
Management Impacts on Seed Quality, Crop Microclimate and Arthropod Populations in Arid/Semi-Arid Environments
Scientists at New Mexico State University are seeking to understand the relative impact of different management practices on insect populations. Their work in 2003-04 specifically focused on determining the impact of plant node and position on seed quality; relating characterizations of egg damage to specific predators, determining the effect of irrigation timing and plant population on insect pest egg hatch rates, and determining the effect of temperature and relative humidity on development of beet armyworm and cotton bollworm.
Among their findings in this project was that mortality is extremely high for bollworms exposed to desert-like conditions with both low relative humidity and high temperatures. However bollworms exposed to only high temperatures or low humidity had relatively high survival.
Emissions From a Multi-fueled Burner for the Cotton Industry
The vendor that had originally agreed to provide a burner has not had one available since the funding was in place for this project – which aims to collect data on emissions from burning cottonseed oil.
Once a burner is secured, engineers at the USDA-ARS Southwestern Cotton Ginning Research Laboratory in Mesilla Park, NM, hope to be able to collect data in about three months.
