Americot’s Plan: Keep Coming On Strong

From Cotton Grower Magazine – November 2016

When USDA’s Varieties Planted report for 2016 was released in mid-September, the most planted variety for the year didn’t come from the usual sources. Americot/NexGen’s NG 3406 B2XF didn’t just outpace the crowded field of cotton varieties. It more than doubled market share over the number two variety for the year, thanks to strong showings in the Mid-South and Southwest.

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Terry Campbell, Americot general manager, says that ranking is no accident. It’s all part of the plan.

“We don’t rush products into markets where they really aren’t suited,” he explained. “Our breeding program is really a great big conventional breeding program. When our conventional varieties meet all of the needs that growers have, then they’re available for trait integression.

“There’s no replacement for the hands-on visual in the field and seeing how the varieties and growers respond,” he adds. “It’s just the art of breeding.”

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For Americot, it’s an art that’s been perfected over the past several years and has resulted in an impressive portfolio of high performing varieties that are on or coming to the market.

NG 3406 B2XF is the centerpiece of the product lineup – an early-to-medium maturing variety with excellent yields and fiber quality that is well adapted to a broad geographic section of the Cotton Belt, with success on both irrigated and dryland acres. Many of the company’s other varieties bring the same high yield potential and fiber quality, targeted to specific areas of the Belt.

NG 3405 B2XF and NG 3522 B2XF provide solid options for growers in Kansas and northern areas of the Texas Panhandle, Mid-South and Southeast. NG 3517 B2XF and NG 3500 XF bring tolerance to Verticillium wilt and bacterial blight to the south plains on Texas. NG 4545 B2XF – a medium maturing variety – brings the same disease tolerances to growers in the rolling plains of Texas and Oklahoma.

A medium-to-fuller season variety – NG 5007 B2XF – has performed well for growers in the rolling plains of Texas, south Texas, Oklahoma and southern parts of the Southeast.

For 2017, the company plans to offer three new Bollgard II XtendFlex varieties and one XtendFlex only variety to their lineup:

  • NG 3699 B2XF and NG 3640 XF both provide high yield potential and excellent fiber quality, as well as Verticillium wilt and bacterial blight tolerance, to the south plains of Texas.
  • NG 4601 B2XF is well suited to the lower Mid-South, lower Southeast and central and south Texas.
  • NG 4689 B2XF targets the south and rolling plains of Texas and Oklahoma with excellent yields and fiber quality, plus disease tolerance.

But, as Campbell notes, the work is far from over.

“We’ll continue to bring disease tolerance and smooth leaf and smooth stem varieties for the Southwest,” he says. “But we’re also planning to introduce new varieties from germplasm that we acquired in 2007 – more traditional picker varieties adapted to central and south Texas, the Mid-South and the Southeast. Our first products coming from that unique germplasm will be Bollgard 3 XtendFlex varieties.

“There’s a lot of excitement behind these products,” he states. “Some of this germplasm is going to give us an opportunity to develop products that are more suited for the Southeast.”

All of that – plus the company’s attention to providing high quality seed and its experienced, knowledgeable field staff – is, as Campbell would say, just part of following the plan.

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