This project continued CRDC sponsorship of a development extension officer in a co funding arrangement with DPI&F in Queensland. An industry-sponsored review of the national extension effort for cotton determined such positions should actually reside within the State Departments of Agriculture.

Drainage from below the plant root zone is not only a waste of water resources but a potential driver of rising water tables and salinity. Better estimates of the quantity and timing of drainage are required in the clay plains of the northern Murray Darling Basin to improve understanding of drainage processes, in particular under irrigation. This will allow better assessment both of how and where improvements can be made in irrigation management and of the risk of salinity. Current drainage estimates are based on indirect measurements - such as chloride mass balance - or on calculations using measurements or estimates of other components of the water balance. Both approaches lead to large uncertainties in drainage estimates. Direct measurements of drainage are difficult because most instruments disturb the hydraulic gradient in the soil, which is the main driver for drainage, and therefore affect the amount of drainage measured.A variable tension drainage lysimeter was built at the Australian Cotton Research Institute near Narrabri to provide accurate measurements of drainage under an irrigated cotton-wheat rotation on a Grey Vertosol typical of the region. Such lysimeters are designed not to disrupt the hydraulic gradient by being 'hydraulically invisible' so as not to interfere with the rate of drainage. The lysimeter consists of an array of six steel boxes whose upper surface is made of a porous, sintered steel sheet that, once saturated, allows water to flow but can hold a vacuum of up to 32 kPa. The boxes were installed at 2.1 m depth via tunnels excavated horizontally from a concrete access shaft. Thus the soil over the trays is undisturbed. The trays cover an area of 1.8 x 0.9 m. A method of preparing the soil on the ceiling of the tunnel was developed that uses a resin peel to remove any smearing. A contact material to connect the upper surface of the tray to the soil ceiling was designed and manufactured by grading silica flour.The system mimics the hydraulic gradient in the soil by regularly measuring the soil water potential at 2.1 m depth with tensiometers and then applying a vacuum equal to this potential to the inside of the trays. A data logger continuously adjusts the vacuum to the soil water potential. Water in the soil above the trays therefore experiences the same hydraulic gradient as if the trays were not there and flows at the same velocity into the trays. The trays have sloping floors which direct the water to a drain and thence to cylindrical collection vessels that are continuously weighed allowing the rate of drainage to continuously measured. The system is designed to be fully automated.Apart from providing accurate measurements of drainage over time, the lysimeter will be used as a benchmark against which to test other simpler - and less expensive methods - that can be deployed in a wider range of situations. Barrel lysimeters, wetting front detectors, and instruments to measure other water balance components have been installed near the lysimeter. Chloride mass balance measurements are also regularly made nearby.In addition, the data from the lysimeter will be used to improve water balance models that provide the only way of estimating the long-term drainage of current and alternative management systems for a variety of soil and climatic conditions.

Australian cotton is purchased for a premium as it meets spinner's requirements on the basis of quality and consistency. Coarse (high micronaire) fibre, high nep counts and excessive short fibre content are aspects of Australian cotton that spinners would like to see improved. Fibre quality in the field is affected by a large number of interacting factors: variety, seasonal conditions, crop and harvest management. This project continues explicit and important research employing a combination of both in-field and post-harvest research efforts to improve the quality of Australian cotton, key strategies of both the CRDC and CRC. Improving the understanding of the links between agronomy and textile performance will allow us to better refine in-field crop management recommendations to ensure cotton produced meets or exceeds market expectations.Specific objectives were to: (i) Improve the understanding of the effects of crop stress on micronaire and its components fineness and maturity. (ii) Reduce neps in the field through development of monitoring approaches to identify instances where crops have an increased risk of neps. (iii) Identify management practices that improve the consistency of cotton taken from the field. (iv) Conduct research to establish the value (price and textile value) of blending/segregation of lint quality based on quality attributes. (v) Identify other unique fibre quality attributes of Australian cotton to enhance its market value. (vi) Maintain research capability and activities into fibre quality research from the 'field to fabric'. This project was successful in providing new knowledge on fibre quality issues through:- Improved understanding of the changes in crop management practices and climate that affect micronaire and its components of linear density and maturity.- A new methodology to predict micronaire using temperature

This project has addressed issues that have emerged with the widespread adoption of Bollgard II cotton, and the resulting reduction in insecticide use.

The Rural Water Use Efficiency Initiative ran from July1999 to June 2003. The key achievements were:Greater than 75% awareness and participation in the program Cotton and grain irrigators investment of $3.6 million with a government contribution of $1.5million 78% of cotton irrigators had become involved in Cotton BMP by August 2001A 12.8% increase in water use efficiency (equivalent to ~ 60 000 ML). An increase in GPWUI ranged from 45% to 55% and the change in IWUI ranged from - 11% to 30% shown below when compared to the baseline for WUE in the Australian Cotton Industry was determined by Tennakoon and Milroy (2003).

The &quote;Diseases of Cotton&quote; projects have run since 1984 and have played a key role in monitoring the emergence and decline of cotton diseases over time, often following the adoption of new technologies.Consequently, the data gathered through these projects has helped the industry assess the effectiveness of its R&D investment in cotton breeding and integrated disease management. The research outlined in this report adds to the important long-term data set of disease severity and incidence collected throughout other Diseases of Cotton projects.In-depth molecular studies highlight previously unknown variation in some seedling pathogen populations that may explain increased seedling mortality in southern NSW. And results of long-term experiments at the Australian Cotton Research Institute continue to build a better picture of the effectiveness or otherwise of potential integrated disease management strategies over time.

Sicot F-1 is a new cotton variety released in 2004. It has been developed specifically in response to the appearance of a new unique strain of the Fusarium wilt pathogen in Australia. This article describes the identification of introduced germplasm with greater resistance to Fusarium wilt than was evident in local varieties and also in varieties resistant to other strains of the pathogen in other countries. The development of Sicot F-1 from that material is described. The level of resistance is double that of the standard SiCot 189. Fusarium wilt of cotton in Australia, caused by the soil-borne fungus fusarium oxysporum vasinfectum, was first noticed and identified by Joe Kochman on the Darling Downs in 1993. The pathogen is thought to have been present as a native on weeds and well-suited to susceptible varieties of cotton grown through the 1980s. The pathogen is very virulent, capable of killing 100% of plants of a susceptible variety when high levels of inoculum are present. The disease has spread to and identified in all cotton growing regions in eastern Australia except Emerald, lower Namoi, Lachlan Valley and Tandou. Farm hygiene and other Integrated Disease Management practices are also important and are promoted in many venues. This paper describes the identification of resistance and development of a new variety.

Airborne volatiles emitted by flowers and other vegetative plant parts that attract insects for feeding and egg-laying could be useful in pest management. Over the last 6 years or so, we have developed blends of plant volatiles that can be used as attract-and-kill for Helicoverpa moths in cotton and other crops. Our first approach to developing attractants was to screen various plants for attractiveness to these moths in the laboratory using an o1factometer (Beerwinkle et al 1996), and to identify the compounds emitted by these plants (Gregg et al 1998). Our attractant blends were not mimics of certain attractive plants but mixtures or &quote;super blends&quote; of compounds that were in common in the most attractive plants. Small-scale field trials on sweet coin and green beans in Bowen, Qld showed that attractant blends including 0.5% methomyl killed substantial numbers of Helicoverpa and other noctuid pest moths for up to 6 days after spraying (Del Socorro et al 2002). In this paper, we will describe the two large-scale field trials of attract-and kill in cotton during the 2002-2003 and 2003-2004 seasons on the property &quote;Warnara&quote;, near Cecil Plains, Qld, including the impact of these trials on moth numbers and oviposition, and the implications of attract-and-kill technology as a novel tool in the area-wide management of Helicoverpa

Seedling establishment typically represents a significant bottleneck in the population dynamics of trees and shrubs in riparian and floodplain habitats of inland Australia (e.g. George et al., 2005; Thoms et al., 2007). Woody riparian species of semi-arid and arid regions often produce large numbers of seeds that typically germinate rapidly and opportunistically (e.g. Streng et al., 1989; Chong and Walker, 2005). The survival of seedlings in these hydrologically variable habitats, however, tends to be low and patchy, both spatially and temporally (Streng et al., 1989; Hughes, 1990; Cooper et al., 1999; Horton and Clark, 2001). Knowledge of the factors influencing seedling survival is therefore critical to understanding vegetation dynamics in these environments.Vegetation structure in semi-arid and arid riparian and floodplain habitats is usually governed by the unpredictable patterns of flooding and drying that characterise these environments (e.g. Stromberg 2001; Brock et al., 2006). Hydrology also tends to have an overriding effect on seedling growth and survival in riparian habitats (e.g. Cooper et al., 1999; Horton and Clark, 2001; Capon et al., 2009). Seedlings are typically more vulnerable to the stresses imposed by flooding and drought than mature plants due to their smaller size (Cooper et al., 1999; Gindaba et al., 2004). Flooding can have a direct influence on seedlings through soil anoxia and toxicity, reduced light, mechanical damage and burial but may also provide structural support (Blom et al., 1990; 1996). The magnitude of these flood-induced effects are likely to vary with seedling size and developmental stage as well as flood characteristics such as depth, duration and timing (e.g. Capon et al., 2009). In arid systems, floodwaters also provide an important source of soil moisture during periods of flood recession which may favour seedling growth. The rate of drawdown of the water table can therefore be an important influence on the survival of seedlings into subsequent dry periods (Horton and Clark, 2011).

The Healthy Soils for Sustainanable Farms - Accelerating adoption of integrated soil management practices in irrigated cotton and grain&quote; rejuvenated soils extension and emphasised the importance of soil health in the irrigated cotton and grains industry.