Mississippi Rice Progress – May 22, 2013

We continue our trend of just a couple of good days of field work before receiving a rain.  In general, rainfall amounts ranged from 0.75″ to 2.5″ on Tuesday night, May 21.  Planting progress increased to 48% according to the May 19th USDA report.  The question of the week so far is how late can we plant.  I would not recommend planting rice later than June 10th.  When we planted rice the first week of June over the last 7 years, we averaged 78% of the relative yield potential among popular rice varieties including Cocodrie, Cheniere, CL111, CL151, and Rex.  In 2012, we actually harvested 88% of the relative yield potential.  The lowest was in 2010 when we only harvested  68% of the relative yield potential.  Selecting varieties or hybrids based on yield potential is good; however, we never sell potential, so I recommend for those who are still planting rice in June to consider selecting a variety or hybrid that has a good combination of standability and yield potential.  Grain yields for hybrid rice are typically more stable when planted late.  My concern for hybrids when planted late is lodging and shattering potential.  Rex and CL152 are the best choices for our area for pure line varieties when you consider the combination of yield potential and standability.  RoyJ from Arkansas has very good straw strength; just know that its maturity can be 7 to 10 days longer than Rex.

Rice that was planted in April is really progressing with the warmer days and nights.  I anticipate a fair amount of rice to go to flood the next time the soil dries to get fertilizer and herbicides out.  I will be writing a separtate blog post in the next couple of days regarding our research and recommendations for nitrogen stabilizer products.