This show includes the following segments: 

• Cotton Update
• Mesonet Weather
• Covid-19 Pulse Survey
• Livestock Marketing
• Cow-Calf Corner
• Market Monitor
• Horse & Blister Beetles

 

(upbeat music)

 

>>> Hello everyone and welcome to SUNUP.

I'm Lyndall Stout.

Some Oklahoma horse owners have spotted blister beetles

in their barns and around their pastures.

We'll have more for you coming up

a little bit later in the show.

But first, we're talking about Oklahoma's cotton crop.

Here's Sunup's Dave Deken and our Extension

Cotton Specialist, Dr. Seth Byrd.

 

Cotton Update

>>> Here we are in July and cotton is growing

across the state, Seth, it's kinda popping up

in nontraditional cotton areas across the state

and we've seen that happen over the past couple a years.

How does the crop look?

>>> Overall, it looks pretty good.

You know, we usually have this planting window

through the entire month of May

and this year you really saw it kind of abbreviated.

You saw a lot of cotton go in in early May.

I think a lot of our Panhandle region,

are you talking about the, sort of,

nontraditional or newer areas?

Most of the Panhandle region probably went in

in that early May time period.

Some of the southwest and even the west central portion,

sort of our more traditional areas had started in early May

and then we got that pretty solid rain

in the middle of the month and that pushed some folks off,

and came back to planting in late May.

So, we kinda have these two real big windows

of planting that we had this year.

UECA put us at 640,000 acres,

I think we're a little under that.

But we're still probably around the 600,000 mark

and that puts us easily third

in the nation in planted acres.

And I think the majority of those in our state

look fairly good now, if not better.

So overall, it's pretty good

but we have certainly lost some acres.

>>> Are we seeing any pressure with the insects,

with any pests at all?

>>> We had some thrips pressure early on

and that's something that we expect in certain areas.

Between seed treatments and folks scouting

and getting some over sprays out we can usually,

if we're timely, we can usually be pretty good

about controlling thrips and minimizing their damage.

And I think, for the most part, we've done that this year.

Now as we're moving into flowering,

most of the state's, probably,

gonna be flowering this week or by the end of next,

we're gonna start getting into our stinkbug pest

and our worm complex, or caterpillars.

So, stinkbugs, obviously, need to scout for those.

Tobacco budworm is usually something that we have had

successfully controlled with our Bt traits.

Corn earworm, or a lot of folks will refer to it

as the bollworm, that's been something

that's been a little more touch and go.

We've seen a lot of weakness with our 2-gene Bt traits.

Most of Oklahoma's got a 3-gene trait planted.

But, even still, we have seen some other areas

of the Cotton Belt who've had issues with controlling,

or getting total control of that species

with even 3-gene Bt traits.

So, as we move into this part of the season,

continuing to scout is gonna be just as important

as it was early to make sure we can control those pests.

Especially, with a lot of our acres

being in a situation where yield potential is pretty good.

>>> Moving forward, we're getting into the need for moisture,

for heat units, just kinda paint a broad picture

of that timeline for when the cotton plant

needs the heat units 'cause in the past years

we've needed 'em, clouds have rolled in,

we've got rain, whatever we needed that boost in that.

>>> Yeah, so from here on out, most of our state

is gonna be able to put on effective flowers

and I mean a flower that will become a healthful

mature boll, between this week and mid-August.

In some areas it may be a little earlier,

in a lot of areas it's gonna be a little later.

So, we really need another six to seven weeks

of favorable conditions, at least.

Really we could use it throughout the mid-September.

I've seen, probably, some of the best dryland cotton

this year that I've ever seen in Oklahoma or otherwise.

It's just we've had some really good looking dryland cotton.

We do a lot of on-farm dryland variety trials

with our producers and to be a dryland cotton grower

you gotta have a different, sort of, way about it anyway.

So, we work with some really good growers and these folks

have got tremendous stands of cotton this year.

So, I really hope we can keep catching some of these rains

'cause the potential in those fields, right now,

is great and if we could just meet 90%, 80% of it

we're gonna have a pretty good crop.

>>> Well thanks very much Dr. Seth Byrd, Extension

Cotton Specialist, here at Oklahoma State University.

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Mesonet Weather

>>> Welcome to the weekly Mesonet weather report, I'm Wes Lee.

If you think it's been hot lately just wait,

as the old saying goes, you ain't seen nothing yet.

Forecast heat for Saturday afternoon has us seeing

some of the hottest temperatures encountered in a long time.

Triple digit heat is likely for a vast majority

of the state.

One of our most heat tolerant crops in the state is cotton.

In areas where moisture is adequate,

mainly irrigated fields, the cotton crop

is looking pretty good.

One way to measure the heat, as it relates

to a specific crop is with degree days.

The degree days for cotton, at three locations,

are shown in this chart.

The blue bars are degree days for Altus, Hinton and Hooker.

The orange bars are the five-year average

for those locations, this assumes a planting date

of May 15 and run through, July 7.

It shows this year's accumulation

is very similar to the five year average

in the south at Altus,

and at the middle of the state at Hinton.

And Hooker in the Panhandle

it is running a little ahead of average.

Expect degree days to climb rapidly

over the next few weeks.

The forecast is showing a much higher than normal chance

of extreme temperatures as seen in red

on this map for next week.

Gary is up next talking about

the ever expanding drought picture in Oklahoma.

>>> Thanks, Wes.

And good morning everyone.

Well, we've had some pretty decent rains

at least over parts of the state

over the last couple of weeks.

How has it impacted the drought?

Let's take a look at the new map

and see what we have.

Well, as is often the case in Oklahoma

with the drought impacts that we're seeing,

it's often one step forward and two steps back.

And that's what we're looking at on the new map.

We do still have severe drought

across much of the Western Panhandle.

And then we have a new area

a larger area of moderate drought

that covers much of the northeastern quarter of the state.

So, again,

when we talk about improvements

I'm afraid it was one step forward,

and then two steps back.

So looking at those rains

over the last couple of weeks

we do see that lots of generous rains

scattered here and there.

Unfortunately, they are very scattered.

So it really looks like mother nature

just sort of threw up on this map.

So some good rains in some places.

The Panhandle got some decent rains

which is why we had some improvements there.

And eastern Oklahoma got some decent rains

over the last couple of weeks.

The picture becomes a little bit more clear

if we go out to the 90 day timeframe.

With this Mesonet rainfall map we see

much of the northwestern half of the state basically

six inches or less.

When we get into certain parts of that area

like in Blaine, Kingfisher County,

we get down to around five inches

less than four inches in Dewey County.

Then out in the Panhandle Of course,

it's less than four inches.

And it looks like that pattern might stick with this.

And then we see

the outlook for next week

from the Climate Prediction Center.

Once again greatly increased odds

of below normal precipitation

over that six day period.

So certainly not good news there.

As I've said before,

having a drought going into the summer months

is not a good situation

especially into July and August.

But hopefully we can get some rain back in here

and start to tamp that drought down a little bit.

That's it for this time.

We'll see you next time on the Mesonet weather report.

 

Covid-19 Pulse Survey

>>> Switching gears now from the weather

to the economic forecast amid the pandemic.

Dr. Courtney Bir and team surveyed Oklahoman's

to see how they feel about the recovery efforts.

 

>>>So the poll survey was developed

by a team of Ag Econ professors and extension specialists.

And we really just wanted to get a feeling

of what Oklahoman's believed.

How Oklahoman's believe the economy was doing

in respect to COVID-19.

We had 796 respondents,

and those people came from 71 of our 77 counties.

So the top counties were Payne, Grady,

Oklahoma, Muskogee and Tulsa counties.

So we had pretty good representation across the state.

So we asked questions about the economy

and then also questions regarding

comfort level in group settings.

So we're hoping to use this information to plan

what we're gonna do next in response to COVID-19.

We also found out that 45% of respondents

believe that we would be dealing with this COVID situation

and the worst of it wouldn't be over for another 10 months.

So most people in Oklahoma believe that

we'll be dealing with this COVID situation in the long run,

and so that will help us develop some programming.

And we actually found that 66% of respondents in rural areas

were comfortable with having an in person meeting

of 10 or less people following social distancing rules.

But when you look at the entire state of Oklahoma

that number drops down to 56%.

So we're gonna continue likely to follow CDC rules,

and to offer multiple ways

to communicate with our people in Oklahoma

including online options for meetings and webinars.

We have a publication with this information

that's currently live online

at the COVID website for OSU Extension.

So go to OSU Extension,

click on the COVID link and it's there.

It's also available as a current report.

And again, we wanna thank everyone for their participation.

We're considering doing this sort of survey

again in the future as things progress.

And your participation will really be helpful

in helping us make decisions to better serve you.

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Cow-Calf Corner

>>> On the Cow-Calf Corner

we have talked about

the importance of protein, energy, minerals for cattle,

but arguably perhaps the most important ingredient

that cattle need is water,

especially with the hot summer times

that we have here in Oklahoma.

A lot of different factors

go into the water requirement of beef cattle.

But for planning purposes

we have to boil this down

to some pretty simple rules of thumb,

so that we can plan to make sure

that there's enough water

that's going to be available in water ORS, or in tanks

that we might put out

for a large number of cattle out in the pasture.

The University of Georgia extension specialists

have done an excellent job of boiling this all down

in one of their facts sheets,

and give us some rules of thumb to remember

for the water requirements

for beef cattle in the summertime.

And they basically said

this is what they're going to need on the average

if the temperature is going to be 90 degrees or above

during the daytime.

Which of course means most of summer here in Oklahoma.

For dry cows

let's say those cows that are gonna calve this fall,

they need one gallon per hundred pounds of body weight.

In that situation,

that 90 degree day in the summertime.

If the cow is a spring-calving cow,

one that has a calf at-side, then you need

to double that to two gallons per hundred pounds

of body weight.

So let's use the example of 1,200 pound cows.

That means if it's a dry cow then she's going to need

about 12 gallons of water per day;

if it's a lactating cow, about 24 gallons of water per day

here, in the summertime.

Bulls, of course, would be about the same

as that dry cow, so if you have that 1-ton bull out there,

you wanna remember he needs about 20 gallons

of water per head, per day.

Younger stock, it's a little bit different situation.

It depends so much upon what their diet is.

If it's a real dry diet, say dry hay and grain,

then they need about that two gallons per hundred pounds

of body weight.

So if you've got, say 600 pound stockers out there

in a pen that's consuming a dry feed,

they're gonna need about 12 gallons of water per day.

On the other side of the coin, let's say you have

those same size stockers out on wheat pasture

in the springtime, when it's cool

and that wheat pasture's lush, has very high moisture

and their water requirements are about half that,

or only about six gallons per head, per day.

But I think if you'll remember

that one gallon per 100 pounds of body weight

for dry cows, two gallons of water per hundred pounds

for that lactating cow,

that'll go a long ways towards helping you

plan your water needs during the summertime.

And if you'd like to learn a little more

about water requirements and water quality,

I'm gonna make a link in the Show Links

for SUNUP to that Georgia Extension Fact Sheet.

I think it's a really well-written fact sheet

that gives you a lot of really understandable details

about water requirements for beef cattle.

So go to the SUNUP Website.

That's SUNUP.OKState.edu, look under Show Links

and we'll have the link for that fact sheet, there.

Hey, we look forward to visiting with you

again next week, on SUNUP's Cow Calf Corner.

 

Livestock Marketing

>>> We've made it to the halfway point of 2020

which was kind of a feat in itself, but Derrell

what do you see for markets in the second half?

>>> Well, obviously the first half of this year

was unlike anything we've ever seen or could have imagined.

We've been through a lot.

The second half of the year we'll have some features,

unfortunately, that will continue, some of the same themes.

Certainly, some things will be different and you know,

I think there's some reasons to be a little more optimistic

in the second half.

But obviously, we're not done with this thing, yet.

There's a number of things still going on,

the public health issues continue,

we may be through the worst of it, hopefully,

but we really don't know, at this point.

There's a lot of economic challenges ahead of us

in the US economy, the global economy, and so on.

So there's some reasons to sort of think about

a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel,

but we clearly have some issues ahead of us, yet.

>>> We saw prices kinda climb up during the peak

of the crisis on the protein side.

Prices have kinda gone down a little bit.

Is that gonna be a trend more towards the normal

cost of proteins?

>>> I think so, you know, from a consumer standpoint,

the protein sector should look a lot more normal,

a bit, in terms of the supply and the overall price levels,

and so on, in the second half of the year.

Now, we could still have problems, again.

That would be some sort of resurgence of challenges

but I really don't think that'll happen.

We've got some major macro-economic

challenges in the US.

We've covered a lot of that with stimulus type money

and unemployment benefits, and so on,

but as we work through those, if those run out,

depending on whether we decide to continue 'em,

all of those things will factor in to sort of how beef

demand plays relative to actually, fairly abundant supplies

of beef and other meats in the second half of the year.

>>> March, February, April,

cattle producers were kinda caught off-guard

whenever all of this happened.

Do you see any bumps in the road, moving forward

for cattle producers?

>>> Well, it depends on kinda which market we look at.

So, the fed cattle markets still has a lot of issues.

We created a lot of backlog in the first half of the year.

It's gonna take much of the second half of the year,

at least through the third quarter, to work through that.

And that will, in turn,

have some limitations kind of a dark cloud

hanging over feeder cattle markets as well,

until we really get these feed lots flowing again

in a more typical kind of sense.

You know, there's one scenario where you could be

pretty optimistic about calf prices by this fall.

On the other hand, there's a lot of uncertainty

and I think producers have to stay pretty cautious

and just kinda see how the thing evolves

over the next several weeks.

>>> Earlier in your answer, you said a dark cloud.

Are there any bright spots throughout the past six months?

>>> (chuckles) Well, you know,

(chuckling)

there's one thing I guess is that there's opportunity

when there's volatility.

And so for cattle producers going forward,

we've been through a lot, we're trying to recover from that.

Most of that's kinda defensive in nature, you know,

we're back on our heels a little bit,

but as we go forward, there will be

some opportunities in this,

and so, and those will be different opportunities

at different levels as time goes on.

Again, more than likely, with good, strong beef demand,

perhaps after some rocky times ahead.

And internationally, that may be one of our brighter spots

as we look towards the end of the year and into next year.

>>> Okay, thank you very much.

Dr. Derrell Peel, Livestock Marketing Specialist

here, at Oklahoma State University.

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Market Monitor

>>> The scuttlebutt with the farmers throughout the state

is that they're concerned with the basis.

So Kim, is there anything to be concerned with, there?

>>> Yeah, I think there's some concern on the basis.

Is the basis being used to hurt the farmers?

No.

Is there collusion on the basis?

No, I don't think so, but if you'll

look at the Kansas City protein basis,

you know, we talk a lot about that,

this time last year, for 11.2% protein wheat

which is about what we're gonna have this year.

... it was $1.20.

For 12.4 wheat,

is $1 55.

That's a 35-cent premium for 12.4,

over 11.2 wheat.

This year,

that 11.2 is 87 cents,

33 cents lower than it was last year.

12.4 protein was $1.25:

38 cents.

So the spread between 11.2 and 12.4 is about the same

for this year and last year.

But this year's Kansas City-basis.

This year's export basis is 33 cents less

than it was last year.

That means their cash price,

relative to the futures price,

is 33 cents less than last year.

Yeah, that leaves some room for some concern,

but it doesn't mean someone's taking advantage of you.

>>> So how do we ease that concern and get that basis higher?

>>> Well, the one is,

understand what's going on.

I think if you'll look at that 35-cent premium

for 12.4 protein,

the market's telling you they want protein.

Also,

this time last year we had averaged about 11.4,

a little bit higher.

But we had protein in the bin that we could blend that up

to get it up to the milling specifications.

I think we've used all that protein wheat.

So they don't want that.

Also,

the market has taken carry out of it.

That means this time last year,

the market was paying the elevators 22 cents

to store wheat from September to December.

This year they're only paying them 11 cents.

So you've got some reason there for a lower cash price.

But you balance that futures from basis out.

The cash price right now is within about seven cents

of what it was last year.

What producers can do is...

Yes,

be concerned about that low price,

but ask the question:

How can I get a higher price for my wheat?

>>> Well, the 2020 wheat crop is in the bin.

And previously,

you've been talking about doing a third,

and a third, and a third,

but maybe altering those months.

What should they do with their wheat now?

Has anything changed?

>>> Well, I don't think much has changed

unless you go back maybe five or six years,

when...

Really,

you gotta go back about 10 years

for sell a third and harvest a third September,

October, and the final third.

I think now you wanna sell your...

Our markets are wheat in June,

July, and August.

So I think they need to start staggering it in.

They may also start looking at pricing some 21 wheat.

Right now you can forward-contract that wheat

for only $4.50.

I don't think you should take that.

But I think you've got to look out in the long-term.

Go ahead and move that wheat out this year.

There's gonna be some rallies.

Sell on those rallies.

Don't sell it all at once

and stagger it into the market.

>>> You mentioned 2021.

So, projecting out,

getting out of this crazy year of 2020,

what can we expect for prices in 2021?

>>> Well, right now the market's telling us

that it's going to be about the same

as it is this year.

I think in 2021,

how to get a higher price,

is maintain that test weight.

We had really good test weight.

Get some protein to sell next year.

Right there's your 35 cents,

you could probably pick up on it.

And they're gonna look at,

well,

maybe I should be planting something besides wheat.

But corn,

a long term outlook for corn,

3.20 for corn,

8.20 for beans,

60 cents for cotton.

All prices are low.

So looking out to 2021,

you've got to look at cost.

How can I keep my costs low?

How can I produce a quality product,

test weight,

and protein?

Then,

how can I merchandise that wheat on the market?

>>> Alrighty, Kim.

Dr. Kim Anderson,

green marketing specialist here

at Oklahoma State University.

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Horses & Blister Beetles

>>> We're talking now about blister beetles

and how they impact horses with Dr. Chris Hiney,

our extension equine specialist.

Chris,

what are you hearing from horse owners around the state?

>>> Well,

we actually had a few calls recently

from some unique circumstances

where they were finding blister beetle swarms actually

in their barn.

>>> That's pretty alarming.

They must be worse this year,

maybe,

than in previous years?

>>> Yeah, year to year,

depending on environmental conditions,

you can have a bigger presence of the beetles.

So probably some of the hotter weather

that was happening drove the beetles inside,

whereas normally,

we'd actually find them out in the fields.

>>> Now obviously,

this is cause for concern

because it can really hurt the horses

and,

obviously,

be painful for people, too.

>>>Yeah,

blister beetles are extremely toxic for horses.

And interestingly,

depending on the species,

it may vary by the amount of beetle that they eat.

So even just a little bit of ingestion

of a beetle can end up being lethal for a horse.

For people,

if you accidentally hit it on your shoulder or anything,

it actually can blister or burn you as well.

>>> So tell us a little bit more about what happens

to the horses,

and what are some signs to keep in mind.

>>> The active ingredient

in a beetle is cantharidin,

and essentially,

it's a blistering agent.

So it will irritate all of the mucous membranes,

essentially,

through the horse's GI tract and urinary tract.

So you may see a horse that is acting colic-y,

like normal horse behavior,

or normal colic-y horse behavior,

lethargic,

they don't want to eat.

You may see a horse actually playing in the water.

So they're thirsty,

but their mouth hurts.

So it looks like they're dunking their head

in the water more than they're actually drinking it.

Uhm because some of the irritation to the mucus membranes

you may see them looking like they straining the

So really look for abnormal behavior signs in your horse

and try to thing about what may actually be causing that.

>>> And they would've ingested the blister beetle

from their hay or grazing in the pasture?

>>> Ya so normally we always warn people about Alfalfa

because of the purple flowers essential in Alfalfa

that's what attracts the beetles.

However any flowering plant or weed can be attractive

for the beetles. In the case of the swarming beetles

if they had gotten into the feed troughs or in their

water buckets the horses might have just accidentally

ingested them.

So we do really need to be careful if we actually see

an outbreak of these guys.

>>> So in terms of control options what kind of guidance

do you have for horse owners?

>>> So the biggest one is actually trying to eliminate weeds,

so certainly not having a lot of flowering broad leaf weeds

in the pasture so weed control that way.

Mechanical control which essentially is mowing

and weeding-eating can help eliminate a lot

of those weeds that uh attract the beetles to your property.

So those are probably the biggest suggestions.

if you do actually find that they're coming into

the barn, then you have to use a premise spray

and make sure that you are using products correctly

and certainly if you ever have questions about any of that

contacting your County educator is a great first step.

>>> How do I know that its time to call the veterinarian

what, you know what is that window of,

of time there to protect the animal?

>>> So uh essentially its a lot of supportive care

for these horses after they've ingested beetles

but the quicker that you start treatment the better.

Uh again this can be a refill condition for horses,

so really getting to know your horses

identifying abnormal behavior and don't hesitate

to call the veterinarian, uh if you see any of those

abnormal behaviors.

>>> For people who wanna learn more there's

an extension fact sheet available.

>>> Yeah its actually it's actually titled

Blister Beetles in Alfalfa.

which is where we normally think

about the beetles occurring,

but it really covers everything

that you need to know concerning these beetles.

>>> Okay, great, thanks a lot.

And for a link to that factsheet

go to sunup.okstate.edu

( lively music)

 

That'll do it for us this week,

a reminder you can find us anytime at sunup.okstate.edu

And also follow us on YouTube and social media.

I'm Tyndall Stout, have a great week everyone

and remember Oklahoma agriculture starts at SUNUP.

(guitar music)