For over 100 years, “Cotton Root Rot” has been a real problem in much of our state. My grandfather once grew cotton on the farm. Just about every small community had a cotton gin. Today some of those cotton gins can still be found in very small farm communities, but they are in ruin. I can still remember cotton fields in our area, but you will have to look long and hard to find a cotton field near you today. There is still cotton raised in Texas, but just about all of it is outside the archdiocese. The reason is Cotton Root Rot.
Now this is perhaps not your first encounter with this problem. This is true even if you live in the center of a large urban community. This is a fact since Cotton Root Rot does not only affect cotton, but it impacts many different types of plans.
When I was a pastor in San Antonio, I had a neighbor to the east whose row of Rose of Sharons died off one after the other. The rectory also had a row of shrubs that also died off right down the line. The same was true of our neighbor to the west. It was odd how over a few years’ time our plants got sick and died, going from north to south. The culprit was Cotton Root Rot. The direction in which the plants were affected was just a coincidence.
About 1,000 different types of plants are affected by Cotton Root Rot. These plants common to your yards are your ornamentals, most landscape plants, fruit trees, nut trees and some shade trees. Farmers are aware that some of the crops they plant can also be affected.
The Cotton Root Rot fungus moves through the soil from plant to plant, attacking the roots. The symptoms show up after the damage has been done. The plant wilts a little, dies back some and loses its vigor. Eventually the plant is killed.
Farmers would rotate their cotton with other crops to slow down the process, but eventually Cotton Root Rot came to the area. The cotton plants would die in spots, and this made farming practices a big problem at harvest time. The affected plants would pull up and stop the picking equipment. Year after year, the lingering effects of Cotton Root Rot led to the overall discontinuation of cotton farming in the immediate area.
The fungus phymatotrichum is the culprit in Cotton Root Rot and we are really close to a solution to this problem. It is still experimental, but flutriafol is showing excellent success in dealing with this problem. Farmers are using Global Positioning Systems to pinpoint the areas where it is needed. It has worked and even shown to have residual carry over effects to the following year.
The product, as I stated, is still experimental and not in the market yet. It is now being determined what the least amount needed for application is. These dosages need to be determined before it can be placed on the market for general use.
The answer to a more than 100 year pest problem has not yet arrived, but we can perhaps see the light at the end of the tunnel. I know that we are always praying for help or solutions to our problems and difficulties. Perhaps this is an answer to the prayers for some farmers and even homeowners.
Father Samuel Heitkamp is a retired priest of the archdiocese and was director of the former rural life organization for the archdiocese.