CROPS

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acreage to be about what we have seen the past two years,” Ross said. “Our acreage should remain around the 3 million acres mark, but we could see some changes one way of the other depending on how planting progresses over the next two months.

“We are just now getting into the early planting window for the southern part of the state, and we still have time to get the soybean crop planted to maximize yields,” he said.

“Both cotton and peanuts will start probably the third week of April,” said Zachary Treadway, extension agronomist for cotton and peanuts.

“If you’re planting past the last day of May you’ve gone too late,” he said. “In a perfect world all of our planting will come between April 20 and May 20 – that’s if the planting season is kind to us.”

“We have some issues last year where it was cool and rained and planting got dragged out and some planting got abandoned all together,” Treadway said.

Soil temperature is the cue for cotton growers to get seed in the ground. “They need a consistent 65 degrees at about four inches of soil depth, he said.

Treadway said that considering the market, he expects to see cotton acres decline slightly in Arkansas while peanut acres may increase.

Price and acreage rollercoaster

Scott Stiles, extension economics program associate, said the markets may do some reshaping of expected acres.

USDA will issue its annual Prospective Plantings report on March 31, giving an overview of farmers’ intentions for the 2025 growing season.

Like Treadway, Stiles expected cotton acres to run lower.

The National Cotton Council “had Arkansas’ cotton acres down 7 percent to 604,000,” Stiles said. “That’s not a surprise and some think cotton acres may be even lower than that. Cotton prices for the 2025 crop touched 70 cents last Friday and again Monday but didn’t stay there long.

“With the heavy supply situation in cotton, there’s little incentive today for it to encourage acres. With so much of the U.S. cotton crop grown in Texas, we may see some weather-related price improvement later in the growing season,” Stiles said.

Corn and soybean prices peaked around February 20th, but “unfortunately, both of those have run out of gas,” Stiles said. There was quick run-up in rice last week, but that rally fell flat too.

“Corn is about 40 cents off its February highs and soybean about 60 cents off its highs,” he said. Since making a recent top March 11, new crop rice futures have pulled back about 23 cents per bushel. The commodities are nervously watching all the global trade dynamics and trying to figure it all out.

“Seasonally, we generally see prices for corn and soybeans work higher through planting and oftentimes peaking by mid-June if crop conditions are favorable,” Stiles said.

If there’s any good news to report, it’s probably the pullback in diesel prices.

“Diesel futures are trading around $2.20 today and that’s 45 cents off the January high,” Stiles said on Wednesday. “It’s a little relief there as field work gets underway.”

To learn about extension programs in Arkansas, contact your local agent or visit www.uaex.uada.edu.

Follow us on social media at @AR_Extension. To learn more about Division of Agriculture research, visit the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station website: https://aaes.uada.edu.