Jefferson County farmers are growing more corn this year than they have in the past, according to area agricultural specialists.
Rod Woods, manager of the U.S. Farm Service Agency office in Pine Bluff, said corn is in favor for several reasons.
“There are definitely more corn acres in the ground so far this year,” Woods said. “One of the reasons is that cotton is not the real lucrative crop that it used to be. Farmers also have corn in their rotation this year to help battle resistant pigweed, which is called that because it has become resistant to most herbicides. The chemicals used on the pigweed can harm other crops but it is OK to use on corn.”
Levell Foote Jr. is a district conservationist with the Natural Resources Conservation Service office in Pine Bluff.
“Farmers that had been growing rice have switched to corn because of the cost of growing rice versus the price they can get for it once the crop is harvested,” Foote said. “The farmers joke that rice is the most expensive cheap crop that they can grow. The biggest money crop for farmers right now is soybeans.”
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
Foote said that while more corn is being planted this year, the percentage being produced for the creation of ethanol is not as high as in the past.
Dennis Bailey, staff chair for the Jefferson County Cooperative Extension Service, said that corn acreage is on the rise in the county.
“There were 240,000 acres of total cropland in Jefferson County in 2011 and we expect to see pretty close to half of that in corn this year,” Bailey said. “Total corn acreage in the county should be around 100,000. The reasons for this are both market-driven and a way for farmers to battle resistant pigweed in their fields. By growing corn for one or two seasons the farmer can use different chemicals to get ahead of the resistant pigweed.”
Bailey said that acreage of rice and cotton are down significantly in Jefferson County this year.
“We should have between 60,000 and 70,000 acres planted in soybeans,” Bailey said. “The rice in the past was somewhere around 55,000 acres but today from what I’ve heard it is down by between 10,000 and 15,000 acres.”
Bailey said that several good rains on a corn crop are what separates a profit, from breaking even or a loss on the season.
“A timely rain once or twice a month makes quite a difference on the bank account of a farmer,” Bailey said. “You need one inch a week of water per acre, which is around 25,000 gallons, so farmers really want the rain to fall when it is needed.”