Eliminating Cotton Root Rot Could Save $20 Million

By Jim.Robinson|December 19, 2012

Plaguing 20% of cotton crops in Texas and Arizona, two of the U.S.’s top producing states, Phymatotrichopsis omnivore – also known as cotton root rot – may have met its match. The disease causes approximately $29 million in annual losses and lives in the soil, thriving with moisture and high temperatures according to Thomas Isakeit, professor of plant pathology and extension specialist at Texas A&M University,. “I have seen that some farms have been substantially affected,” Isakeit says. “One grower, for example, lost 99% of his cotton plants.” Due to an emergency exemption, however, Cheminova, Inc. now has approval for TOPGUARD’s use on cotton crops to protect from this disease.

“Although TOPGUARD is registered for other crops such as soybeans, it does not have a Section 3 label on cotton,” says Deneen Sebastian, Fungicide Portfolio Manager at Cheminova. “However, due to its ability to provide control of cotton root rot (when nothing else works) the Texas Department of Agriculture submitted to the EPA for an Emergency Exemption to use this product.” Sebastian said that prior to this exemption, which is for both the 2012 and 2013 growing seasons, there was no other way to control the root rot other than to plant a crop that was not susceptible.

Isakeit, who began testing the product with Rick Minzenmayer, an IPM agent for Tom Green county, with the financial support of the Texas State Support Committee through Cotton, Inc., says that in his trials he has seen 30% to 60% increases in yields after treatment with TOPGUARD depending on disease pressure.

For more information on TOPGUARD, click here.