A lot has happened since my last blog. Let me see if I can get you caught up…
On Friday, June 20, we began to see a few heads emerge from the flag leaf of the Dale (picture 1) and the Theis varieties. However, it was not until Monday morning, June 23, that approximately one-half of the heads were emerged from these two varieties and an actual heading date was called. As you can see from the second picture below, the M-81 variety has still not headed. In fact, I would estimate that it is still over a week away from heading. Topper 76-6 also looks to be several days from head emergence.
Prior to this week, several issues have plagued us. Probably one of the potentially most devastating was caused by heavy rainfall on May 14. You can see from picture 3 that we had over 5 inches of standing water in the field. Wet soil coupled with strong winds that accompanied the storm caused many of the plants to lodge (picture 4). It took almost five days for the water to drain from the field. Fortunately, the sweet sorghum is a resilient crop and survived the deep water over the 5-day period.
[Image: rice station plot on June 20 - 1]
[Image: rice station plot on June 20 - 2]
| [Image: Rice Station plot on June 20 -3]
[Image: rice station plot on june 20 - 4]
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