A field study was conducted in 1998 at the University of Arizona Marana Agricultural Center (1,974 ft. elevation) to evaluate the effects of three planting dates on yield and crop development for three Upland varieties. Planting dates ranged from 9 April to 28 May and 342-885 heat units accumulated since Jan 1 (HU/Jan 1, 86/55o F thresholds). Crop monitoring revealed early season fruit loss leading to increased vegetative growth tendencies with all three planting dates. General trends also showed decreasing lint yield with the later dates of planting for all varieties. The more determinate variety (STV 474) was able to set and a fruit load more rapidly than the other varieties in this study at several dates of planting, which resulted in higher yields.

Four varieties each of Long Staple and Short Staple cotton were tested over four dates of planting in this study. The first date of planting for the Long Staple cotton was delayed to the 3rd of April because of poor weather earlier. The latest planting was May 13th. Cultivars of differing maturities were tested for both long and short staple cotton to determine their optimal planting time. Many agronomic and hvi values were evaluated to determine the effect of different planting dates.

Deltapine 458B/RR, Deltapine 5415RR, Deltapine 20B, and Deltapine 20 cotton varieties were planted on June 5 into narrow 15 inch wide rows. Populations ranged from 80,000 to 100,000 plants per acre. Seed cotton was stripper harvested on December 17. Although lint yields were somewhat low (1- 2 bale/acre) for this late planted cotton, we learned several important practices for effective narrow row cotton production systems, based on our first years experience in western Arizona.

A field experiment was conducted near Marana, AZ in 1998 to evaluate the effectiveness of a number of defoliation treatments on Upland (var. Stoneville 474) cotton.. All treatments consisted of materials commercially available in Arizona. Results reinforce general recommendations regarding the use of low rates (relative to the label ranges) under warm weather conditions and increasing rates as temperatures cool. Defoliation treatments of Ginstar alone did a satisfactory job of defoliation and regrowth/topgrowth contol and were very similar to Dropp + Def combination treatments. Adding Prep to Ginstar in this experiment did not improve defoliation or topgrowth control.

Defoliation tests were conducted on upland and Pima cotton at the Maricopa Agricultural Center to evaluate the use of low rates of Ginstar for preconditioning cotton, several rates of Ginstar and tank mixes of Ginstar and Def. The upland cotton used in this test was generally difficult to defoliate, probably because of cool night temperatures. One application of Ginstar + Def gave acceptable defoliation of upland cotton 14 days after treatment (DAT) and this treatment was as good as using Ginstar as a preconditioner followed by Ginstar (2 applications of defoliant). For Pima cotton, most Ginstar treatments gave acceptable defoliation 7 DAT. Although defoliation treatments caused some leaf desiccation, it was not a serious problem in these tests. All defoliation treatments resulted in excellent control of terminal regrowth for both upland and Pima cotton.

Arizona Cooperative Extension generates and distributes weather-based Planting Date and Cotton Development Advisories for 19 cotton production areas (Aguila, Buckeye, Cochise Co., Coolidge, Eloy, , Laveen, Litchfield Pk., Marana, Maricopa, Mohave Valley, Paloma, Parker, Pinal Co., Queen Creek, Roll, Safford and Yuma Valley). Planting Date Advisories are distributed from legal first planting date until the end of April and provide updates on heat-unit-based planting windows, recent and forecasted weather conditions, heat unit accumulations, variety selection, soil temperatures, recommended plant population, and early insect management and control. Cotton Development Advisories are distributed from early May through early September and provide updates on crop development, insects, weather and agronomy. The Cotton Advisory Program will continue in 1999, and growers may obtain advisories by mail/fax from local extension offices or by computer from the AZMET Internet Web Page (http://ag.arizona.edu/azmet). Major program changes planned for 1999 include 1) use of historical AZMET weather data for local normals and 2) elimination of the computer bulletin board as a computer-based means of retrieving the advisories.

Weekly advisories developed by the Arizona Cotton Advisory Program are now available from the Internet. Nineteen location-specific advisories are developed each Monday morning and then transferred to the Main AZMET Internet Web Page located at URL address http://ag.arizona.edu/azmet. To retrieve advisories from the Internet users must 1) log on to the Internet using the procedures required by your Internet service provider; 2) enter the URL for the Main AZMET Web Page; 3) move to the Cotton Advisory sub-page; and 4) select the advisory of interest. Advisories for the most recent week, this year to date, and all of 1998 are available at this Internet address.

The Demonstration project was conducted on the Demonstration Farm at the Maricopa Agricultural Center. In this project all current guidelines and recommendations disseminated by the University of Arizona were integrated in a systems approach. The management decisions were made by the Extension Specialists in agronomy, entomology, irrigation management, weed sciences, and plant pathology following the University recommendations. On a 50.5 acre field 80% Bt and 20% non-Bt cotton was planted dry and watered up. Due to the cold spring and sand-blasting, only a stand of 30,900 plants/A could be established with 84% terminal damage. 72 acreinches of water were used with 41.3 acre-inches in postplant irrigations. Weed control could be achieved with one preplant application and three cultivations. Three sprays against Lygus and one spray against whiteflies were necessary after the thresholds were exceeded. A total of 4120 lb seedcotton per acre were harvested, with 32.7% lint turnout (2.81 bales/A) and 45.9% seed turnout (1891 lb/A). After harvesting a field budget was established. The variable costs per acre were $915, the total cost $1266/acre. In spite of the lack of replications this project validates the usefulness and compatibility of University recommendations and the potential for integration of all disciplinary guidelines in one system.

Nine defoliation treatments were applied to Pima and upland cotton to compare the treatment effects on percent leaf drop, trash sent to the gin, lint yields, percent lint turnout and percent first pick. All of the treatments were beneficial to leaf drop compared to the untreated check with the Ginstar treatments generally performing better than the others. The addition of nonionic surfactants and drift retardants seemed to reduce the activity of Ginstar. Yield differences on long staple treatments were notices and discussed in the paper.

Four varieties each of Long Staple and Short Staple cotton were tested over five and four dates of planting, respectively, in this study. The first date of planting for the Long Staple cotton was the 18th of March and for Short Staple cotton the 1st of April. The latest planting was May 13th. Cultivars of differing maturities were tested for both long and short staple cotton to determine their optimal planting time. Many agronomic parameters were evaluated to determine the effect of different planting dates