An Arkansas Discovery Farm for Cotton

Arkansas Agriculture has been implicated by large-scale water quality models as an important source of nutrients that are transported in runoff from agricultural fields to the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi River.  Excessive nutrients in the Gulf are considered responsible for the hypoxic zone of low dissolved oxygen which is degrading aquatic habitat and reducing commercial fisheries. Little to no data of actual measured nutrient losses from the edge of agricultural fields in Arkansas exist to verify or validate the estimates of basin-wide modelling efforts.  To help Arkansas cotton farmers address the concerns arising from these modeling results, we have implemented the Arkansas Discovery Farm programs were we work with farmers to measure the quality of runoff water from real, working farms in Arkansas.  The Arkansas Discovery Farm program for cotton will be described.