DARK storm clouds gathered teasingly over the Armstrong family's two-month-old cotton crop recently on Sharmarel, south of St George in the state's south-west.
The smile on Scott Armstrong's face broadened as he and six-year-old son Jeremy started to pick up the first bit of mud on their boots as they walked into the field.
"It'd be nice if we could get 50 millimetres out of this," Mr Armstrong said.
Unfortunately, his hopes were dashed with the skies soon clear again - the fall unmeasurable.
Like many growers in the region, he has been waiting since April for some decent rain, and without an adequate summer rainfall, is looking down the barrel of another difficult season.
"Last year was the worst season we've had in the 20 years I've been here," he said. "I'm hoping this year is not nearly as bad."
After running out of water in January to finish last season's irrigated cotton crop, Mr Armstrong is depending on 100mm of rain to make up the shortfall in stored water to get through this season.
He has planted just 300 hectares of irrigated cotton of his 2000ha maximum capacity due to water shortages.
But unlike the more than 90 per cent of Australian cotton grown that is genetically modified, Mr Armstrong is continuing to capitalise on conventional cotton by planting the variety Sicot 75RRF for 50pc of his total crop.
The other half he has planted to Genuity Bollgard II with Roundup-ready Flex cotton, opting for the 74BRF variety. Both were planted at 12 seeds per metre.
"I realise I'm very much in the minority [using conventional], but the gross margin on our conventional cotton is always better than the Bollgard," Mr Armstrong said.
He said the conventional cotton produced a higher yield and required a significantly lower cost to produce.
"It's really hard to compare on individual seasons, but year in, year out, there's probably between 5 and 8 per cent improvement in yield.
"[With conventional cotton] we then also don't have to use a portion of our water on the unproductive [refuge] crop being the pigeon pea."
Though he said it was hard to bank on a yield at this point, he thought the crop was "looking exceptional, very promising" to outdo last year's "disaster" after it was cut off from water.
"It's growing very vigorously; we've got light insect pressure and there's good soil moisture because of the water we've put on it."
ABOUT WATER & HEAT
- Benefiting from flood irrigation, this season's crop has already received two waterings, with Mr Armstrong expecting the crop in its early growth stage to maintain a three-week gap between waterings, but hopes rain can extend this period.
- Mr Armstrong rotates his cotton with fodder crops and after happily receiving an average yield this year of 7 tonnes/hectare for his total 300ha of oats, barley and wheat, he is hoping the season will pan out to produce a similarly pleasing cotton pick.
- "We've had a lot of days over 40 degrees - probably more than 10 days over already; cotton loves it," he said. "The hotter and the drier, the happier it is. We're just hoping we can get the water to keep it going."
Andrea Crothers
Town & Country editor for Queensland Country Life.
Town & Country editor for Queensland Country Life.
