There is an increasing use of spreaders for application of urea in the cotton industry. In fact 75% of growers apply granular fertiliser (eg Urea) pre-plant, at planting and in-crop up to flowering (CRDC Cotton Growing Practices 2016). However, a single pass of a broadcast spreader produces an uneven application. Overlapping the spread pattern can improve the uniformity, but the distance between machinery runs to provide the overlap (the bout width) cannot be determined accurately without proper testing.

Uneven application means that parts of the field are being under fertilised, while other parts are being over fertilised, often visible to the eye with a striping pattern across a crop. The performance testing and calibration of a fertiliser spreader is as important as the calibration of spray rigs.

The Australian Fertilisers Services Association and the Australian Fertiliser Industries FertCare initiative have developed Accu-Spread. This involves independent testing and accreditation of fertiliser spreading equipment. Following accreditation, a grower will know the capacity of the spreader to apply urea to industry standards. This means growers will have more confidence in applying an accurate rate, improving the efficiency of fertiliser use and avoiding the patchy, uneven patterns often visible from untested spreaders.

Darren Hart, Cotton Operations Manager, Keytah called CottonInfo to discuss the opportunity to hold a field day in the Moree region looking at spreader testing. He assisted with planning and reviewed the field day program, hosted the Moree Spreader field day and attended the second field day at Bellata.

Ten years into the implementation of Vision 2029, industry growth is being realised and Australian cotton is well on the way to achieving an industry that is differentiated, responsible, tough, successful, respected, capable and innovative.

Industry organisations, including Cotton Australia, Cotton Research & Development Corporation and Cotton Seed Distributors as well AS CottonInfo, the industry’s

joint venture in extension, have aligned their strategic plans with

Vision 2029. The Australian Cotton Industry Forum continues to provide leadership in monitoring and reviewing the vision.

Much has changed over the last ten years in the operating environment for Australian agriculture and the cotton industry. Industry leaders, through the Australian Cotton

Industry Forum, have reviewed not only our progress but also refreshed the vision to ensure it remains contemporary and fit for purpose.

Importantly, everyone involved in Australian cotton has a role to play in achieving Vision 2029.

Ultra-High Pressure Water Jet technology has a number of industrial applications in product manufacturing. The technology uses water pumped through specialised nozzles at ultra-high pressures (50,000-60,000 psi) to create a high powered jet that can be used to very accurately cut through a broad range of materials ranging from steel to carrots. Researchers from the South Australian No Till Farmers Association (SANTFA) have been investigating the potential for this UHP Water Jet technology, termed AquaTill, to be retro-fitted to planting equipment for the purpose of cutting through fallen stubble that would otherwise obstruct the passage of the planting tynes through the soil surface. Compared to a standard cutting disc fitted to many planters for this purpose, AquaTill provides the advantage of cleanly cutting through stubble, eliminating the occurrence of trash ‘hair pinning’ during the planting operation.

Demonstrations of AquaTill in northern NSW by the SANTFA at field days during 2016 piqued the curiosity of a number of cotton growers who expressed an interest in seeing this technology tested for its potential to be used as an alternative method of cotton termination for traditional root cutting.

Root cutting is a commonly deployed crop destruction technique whereby two opposing and overlapping discs are drawn at ground level through the crop and used to cut through the main stem below the cotyledon nodes. Ineffective root cutting can occur when equipment is either not well set up or when in-field conditions are variable (un-even ground or stones), resulting in a percentage of plants that are not severed below the cotyledons and consequently grow back as ratoons, presenting a significant challenge for farm hygiene.

Global warming is surmised to result in major increases in climatic variability (i.e. severe deficiencies and excesses of water for plant production, higher frequency of sub- and supra- optimal growing season temperatures) and changes in pest incidence. In order to maintain yields and profitability, and thus ensure sustainability of the cotton industry, cotton farming systems need to demonstrate resilience in the face of the above mentioned environmental stresses. Resilience can be improved by using suitable tillage and stubble management systems, and crop rotations to improve soil quality and water conservation. Such improvements can be best demonstrated by monitoring in long-term experiments. Indicators of resilience include improvements in soil carbon and nutrients, water storage, soil physical and chemical quality, yield maintenance/profitability improvements over time, and changes in key soil faunal indicator species.

To maintain the productivity of the Australian Cotton Industry, cropping systems that are resilient to these climatic events and the associated soil processes must be identified. This is best done through long-term experiments that capture seasonal variability. The aim of this project was to continue three on-going long-term experiments on selected cropping systems that include practices such as crop rotations, stubble retention, tillage systems and fallow length. Measurements made on an annual basis will include soil carbon and nutrients, physical and chemical quality, crop yields and profitability. Collaborative projects with CSIRO, UNE and other research groups will research soil microbial dynamics of resilient cropping systems, carbon storage in the subsoil, disease incidence, nutrient decline and maintenance, and drainage.

During the previous research the short-term benefits of sowing corn on cotton yield, disease control and subsoil increases in soil carbon were observed. The longer-term impacts of sowing corn in cotton-based farming systems were further investigated in this project. In addition, benefits have been demonstrated in a long term experiment at ACRI with respect to soil faunal indicator species, N, energy use and water conservation in a retained stubble cotton-wheat-vetch system. This long-term investigation is being continued.

Fibre elongation contributes directly to yarn elongation and toughness, which are important particularly in fine count yarn spinning and realised yarn quality. Despite the importance of fibre elongation its measurement has been neglected by industry. A key reason for this has been the lack of confidence in its measurement by high volume instruments.

It is noted that fibre elongation is currently not measured in USDA, Australian or Commercial Standardization of Instrument Testing of Cotton (CSITC) HVI laboratory check tests, nor is any calibration value provided for USDA HVI calibration cottons. Given the effect of fibre elongation on yarn quality and increasing demand for fibre that performs well in fine count yarn, there is a need to address the measurement and management of elongation for the Australian and international cotton industry.

Over 600 fibre samples were collected and measured in this project. The broad aim was to address issues around the information available on fibre elongation values in Australian cotton.

TThis project supported travel, which was conducted in order to participate in the course “Nematodes in Cropping Systems: Identification and Techniques, 2017”. This course provided training and hands-on experience for researchers in sampling, extraction, molecular and microscopic techniques, specimen preparation, culturing, diagnosis and identification of agriculturally important nematodes. The course provided the opportunity to interact with experts in the field as well as networking with course participants from various areas related to nematology research and diagnostics.

There is significant gap between the average industry yield and the top achievers in irrigated cotton industry of Australia. This gap can be reduced significantly by utilizing the opportunity to improve irrigation efficiency. Improving water use efficiency is also increasingly becoming critical with changing climate and the recent changes in government policy, both resulting in potentially less water available for growing irrigated crops including cotton. Australian cotton growers irrigate their crops by monitoring soil water status and their experience; however, many growers are not experienced.

It has been suggested that irrigation management based on plant’s water status might be superior to above mentioned methods as plants respond to both soil and aerial environment. However, easy-to-adopt plant-based irrigation approaches have been difficult to develop with most such methods limited for research purposes only. Canopy temperature which is an indirect measure of crop water status is gaining traction as a practicable method for irrigation scheduling as it can be measured continuously using commercially available infra-red sensors. It has been previously used to schedule irrigation by the BIOTIC (Biologically Identified Optimum Temperature Interactive Console) approach in lateral-overhead and drip systems, with quick irrigation response time (few hours) and capacity for multiple irrigations within a day. Under furrow systems, irrigation intervals are much longer (several days) and is a singular event. This characteristic limits the direct application of the BIOTIC approach to irrigation scheduling of furrow systems. In this study, we developed an approach for optimizing furrow irrigation scheduling using canopy temperature. A time threshold was developed based on the relationship between plant’s water status (leaf water potential) and canopy temperature. This time threshold is defined as the number of hours the cotton canopy temperature can stay above the optimum temperature for physiological functioning of cotton (i.e. 28 °C) without affecting yield. A cotton crop is irrigated when the accumulated stress hours reach the above mentioned time threshold. The feasibility of our approach was tested on cotton in three Australian cotton valleys over two seasons. Yield, yield components, and some fibre quality attributes were similar to those obtained in crops grown under the irrigation practices of high yielding producers using traditional irrigation scheduling approaches. Adoption of our irrigation approach could help boost confidence of irrigators and improve irrigation scheduling of the average cotton grower. Our approach incorporates many of the advantages of applying plant based measure of stress for optimizing irrigation scheduling. This project has truly developed a new and novel tool that will provide the cotton industry an opportunity to be a leader in adopting plant based approaches of irrigation scheduling.

The Australian cotton industry’s first Australian Grown Cotton Sustainability Report, published by CRDC and Cotton Australia, was released in November 2014. The Report is a major outcome of the industry's third environmental assessment, conducted in 2012, which tracks cotton's environmental performance. The Sustainability Report benchmarks how the industry is performing in terms of economic, environmental and social indicators, and charts this performance over time. It also sets high level targets for cotton in the areas of farm productivity, water use efficiency, carbon footprint, biodiversity and work-related injuries and fatalities - and importantly, commits to a plan of action. The Report will be reviewed regularly, to ensure the industry can continuously monitor and improve its performance.

Highlighting the achievements of CRDC's investment in cotton RD&E, ten years after the formation of the organisation.

This report presents the results of an impact assessment of a cluster of nine nutrition research projects funded by the CRDC over the years 2008-2016.

Nutrition is a critical component for profitable agricultural production. Australian cotton producers are heavily reliant on fertiliser inputs to provide crop nutrition, and this typically represents a substantial proportion of overall input costs. Rates, timings, and application methods all need to be optimised, while plant and soil testing methods need to provide information capable of enabling adjustment of these variables under different circumstances. Ongoing nutrition research is required to capitalise on new technologies, adjust current practices to new cultivars and farming systems, and address long-standing knowledge gaps.

In addition to these economic aspects, crop nutrition also has environmental implications in areas including greenhouse gas emissions and water quality.

While the projects in this cluster focused on a wide range of issues, there were two issues of prominence that were addressed. The first was that of nitrogen use efficiency, as growers were applying increasing volumes of nitrogen (N) fertiliser, either due to decreasing NUE or as ‘insurance’ for achieving high yields. The second was that of ongoing depletion of soil reserves of key nutrients, particularly phosphorus (P) and potassium (K).