Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, September 15, 1995 TAG: 9509150067
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LAWRENCEVILLE LENGTH: Medium
Boll weevils, the scourge of cotton until Virginia was declared weevil-free 15 years ago, have been found on three Southside cotton farms.
As of Wednesday, agricultural officials had found one of the beetles in a Greensville County field and two in separate cotton fields in Brunswick County.
Even that small number causes concern. Virginia hasn't seen a boll weevil since 1985, and the most recent sighting before that was in 1980 - the year the state was officially designated free of the pest.
Meanwhile, Virginia farmers are growing more than twice as much cotton this year as they did last year. Agricultural officials are monitoring the afflicted fields and surrounding areas.
``The cotton is not in danger,'' said Phil Eggborn, program manager in the office of plant and pest services for the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. ``There's no trouble in getting rid of a few [weevils] that may show up.
``Our main concern is, how did they get here?''
Boll weevils can eat a lot of cotton very quickly, and the pests were a major reason cotton production nearly stopped in Virginia during the 1960s and 1970s. ``It was almost impossible to control the weevil to the extent where it was possible for the farmer to plant cotton,'' Eggborn said.
Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia are considered free of the pests, which remain a problem in Texas, Louisiana and some other states.
Forrest Hobbs, a Virginia Cooperative Extension agent in Brunswick County, said farmers in the Deep South must spray nine or 10 times a year to control weevils, while growers in Virginia usually spray once.
``That's our competitive edge,'' he said.
Eggborn said a quarantine requires that farm equipment be cleaned before it's shipped from infested areas to weevil-free states, but the regulations don't provide ironclad protection. The weevils could have even hitchhiked to Virginia on cars or trucks that had stopped near infested fields.
The likelihood of finding boll weevils also increases with the amount of cotton being grown in the United States, Eggborn said. ``We've got that much more acreage, that much more equipment coming up from the Southeast.''
Strong prices and hefty yields have fostered a recent cotton comeback. This year, Virginia farmers planted 106,000 acres in cotton, compared to 42,000 acres last year. Overall, the amount of cotton being grown in the South increased more than 10 percent this year.
In the 1980s, Virginia and some other states teamed with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, farmers and the cotton industry to form the Southeastern Boll Weevil Eradication Foundation.
The foundation guards against infestation by requiring that boll weevil traps be set in all cotton fields and checked every two weeks as the bolls begin to form and open, beginning in late summer.
If any weevils are found, agricultural officials set more traps and closely monitor adjacent fields. The findings determine what treatment, if any, is needed before the weevils spread.
``It's a pretty big thing,'' Hobbs said. ``You have to find a real old-timer to find out the last time the boll weevil was [a problem] in Virginia.''
Memo: NOTE: Shorter version ran in Metro edition.