Conservation Conversation

Grain Sorghum – a rotation crop for South Texas. When it comes to farming in Texas and South Texas, the immediate crops that come to mind are cotton and, to some extent, corn. One crop that is sometimes overlooked is sorghum.

The fuzzy-headed grass crop (yes it is a grass), which grows best in dry climates, is often passed over when the subject of southern agriculture comes up.

But a lot of growers in the South rely on sorghum as a dependable dry-land plant for a rotational crop. Grain sorghum is usually rotated with cotton in Kleberg County.

Sorghum is more drought-tolerant than corn and cotton, so particularly for the cotton guys in Texas, it gives them a grass crop that they can afford.

Sorghum is mainly a dryland crop but it certain parts of Texas it is irrigated. It doesn’t need as much water as corn.

It is reported that sorghum requires about half the water corn needs to produce healthy plants, and water is a precious commodity in the wild horse desert of South Texas--where water tables are steadily dropping.

Cotton and sorghum growers usually irrigate their fields with about 300 gallons of water per minute which is not nearly enough for a corn crop.

Sorghum is attractive to cotton farmers because of the rotation and it helps to open them open for the spectrum of herbicides they can use and provides insect control.

Sorghum provides all the benefits of a grass crop in what has traditionally been a broad-leaf enterprise such as cotton.

Almost all of the sorghum grain produced in the U.S. goes toward feed for pigs and poultry, and almost all of the seed produced in the U.S. comes from a production plant in Dumas.

Ninety-plus percent of the sorghum seed produced on earth is produced right there.

About 60 percent of the seed produced at the plant would probably go to Mexico, where sorghum is a bigger crop than in the U.S.; the other 40 percent would be marketed in the U.S.

Even though sorghum might be an afterthought for growers looking for something to rotate with cotton in dry seasons, it remains a valuable commodity for many Southern farmers.

Several companies are working on experimental varieties that are being field-tested as candidates for advancement in the next phase of research for different qualities.

In next week’s column, we will have additional information on grain sorghum and the importance for South Texas.

For conservation information or information on programs, contact the Natural Resources Conservation Service office in Kingsville at 401 East King Avenue or call at 592- 0309 Ext. 3 in Kingsville.

Factoid: Today the average U.S. farmer feeds 155 people compared to 26 people in 1960 (a six fold increase in 50 years.)