John McLemore, County Extension Agent
I hope everyone is doing well as school adjourns and summer begins. As your county agriculture extension agent, I have enjoyed meeting the members of the community when I am out serving the people of the community. I appreciate the warm welcome, and your continuous support of Coffee County Extension.
I want to give an update on Coffee County Extension ANR program. When hired, my goal in addition to serving the community of Coffee County, was to create on-farm research trials centered on the county’s agricultural needs. This year I am proud to announce we have a total of 15 on-farm research trials. Twelve of the 15 on-farm trials are tobacco research focused on using different chemical formulations to reduce soil borne diseases that our farmers currently face to reduce production lost. We also have two on-farm peanut research trials one is using Valent MycoApply EndoPrime to increase root growth to increase harvest yield, and the other peanut trial is a fungicide trial with five different spray programs commonly used by local farmers.
The last of the 15 on-farm research trials is a cotton variety trial with 12 different varieties to measure their impact on cotton production in southeast Georgia. On the peanut and cotton on-farm research trials, data will be collected on plant emergence, yield, and notes will be taking during the growing season on key plant physical characteristics. On the tobacco on-farm trials ratings will be collected on resistance to several soil borne deceases. These on-farm trials are in cooperation with the University of Georgia specialists, local farmers, Atkinson County ANR extension agent Tony Barnes and agricultural companies; without them these trials would not exist, so thank you very much.
In addition to these trial may be displayed during various statewide crop tours during the summer months. The goal of the ANR program is to provide answers to your questions, at the same time, promote new questions. It important to ask questions, give feedback, and provide suggestions to help create the type of research trials needed to help better serve the community of Coffee County.
Remember, if you ate today, please thank a farmer!