Black root rot is a recognised threat to the cotton industry, yet current management strategies are insufficient for disease control. Thus, further research is required in order to develop new strategies to reduce the impact of the disease on the cotton industry. To achieve this, we must first gain understanding of the steps crucial for completing the life cycle of the pathogen, T. basicola, to be able to control the disease in a sustainable manner, i.e. with reduced input, increased profit and reduced negative environmental impact.Understanding the interactions between the pathogen and the plant requires a multidiscipline study involving collaborations among scientists expert in research fields such as microbiology, plant biology, soil biology, fungal genetics, molecular biology and agronomy. It is extremely important to train and educate students in these fields towards understanding plant disease and its management.The summer student Ms Anna Balzer, got intensive training in molecular biology and microbiology, particularly in handling the fungal pathogen T. basicola, and in conducting pathogenicity assays to assess black root rot in cotton. She also conducted assays to examine pathogenicity-related properties in T. basicola, to further our understanding of factors involved in its virulence towards plants. One of the highlights from the results is the optimisation of a minimal growth medium for the fungus, which will facilitate further studies of pathogenicity related traits of T. basicola.

The Cotton Catchment Communities Cooperative Research Centre (Cotton CRC) has commissioned this review of extension services in the Darling Downs and Border Rivers Regions to better understand the needs of mixed enterprises (cotton, grain, grazing) related to resilient farming, to identify opportunities for farming system collaboration, and to assess the need for specialist extension services.

This project collected and collated soil and other geospatial data into a common location andprojection to provide a GIS for the Namoi Catchment Management Authority (CMA) to provideinformation for land management within the Namoi Catchment. Soil information was successfullyobtained from a number of disparate sources: individuals, government departments and researchorganisations or institutions. Unfortunately it was not possible to collate all known soil data for thecatchment as some data were not made publicly available. The geospatial data obtained from varioussources, and derived as part of this project, were successfully brought into a common projection and aGIS provided to the Namoi CMA. This GIS will be useful in planning future field work to target areaswithout sufficient coverage currently as well as providing a source of information for the CMA andother stakeholders in the catchment.

Final Report Mapping available soil moisture content in an irrigated cotton growing field in the lower Gwydir Valley

This project aimed to find a suitable tool to assist growers assess vegetation condition. The desktop review of assessment tools, found most to be very technical, requiring a high level of vegetation knowledge and would be very time consuming. For these reasons they were not considered useful as general landholder tools. It was, however, determined that aspects of some tools could be combined to generate a simpler tool. This was not able to be tested in the field as Robyn McAlpine was unable to continue with the project.

Final Report Protection of cotton seedlings from Thielaviopsis by microbes

Final Report The chemical properties of treated effluent and its effect on cotton germination: a case study on federation farm

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Since 2005, the Cotton Catchment Communities CRC (Cotton CRC) and the Namoi Catchment Management Authority (Namoi CMA) have had a partnership to work with cotton growers within the Namoi valley as well as other government organisations, industry bodies, research organisations and the general community to deliver natural resource management outcomes in line with the Namoi Catchment Action Plan (CAP). The Namoi CMA and Cotton CRC worked collaboratively with research organisations to provide the industry and agency extension staff and growers with the best available information to make land management decisions.

There were primarily two objectives to the project:1. Collate and publish existing information on irrigation management benchmarks within the Australian Cotton industry. The following draft report was prepared: Payero, J.O. and Harris, G.A. 2007 Benchmarking water management in the Australian Cotton Industry, Cotton Catchment Communities CRC/Dept of Primary Industries and Fisheries, Toowoomba2. Implement strategies to gather and report on cotton industry water management benchmarks in an on-going fashion to monitor performance of the industry.