Dawn,

Even though the following is a statement, I really am trying to express the following as a question. To me; it still stands to reason that for soils with tendencies toward root rot presentations, drainage improvements to soil where you plant should help create an unfriendly environment for the rot rot microbes.

I am not an expert but was also wondering if the heat from still hot compost along with its beneficial microbes, if worked into the soil in the late fall, could help fight off some of the more common root rot pathogens; especially if the above mentioned drainage improvements are accomplished in the area where the hot compost is being added?

Another consideration you recent post has inspired me to wonder about is; even though cotton bur compost mulch is not supposed to consist of the cotton roots; is there any danger that, when using it as a mulch or soil enhancer, the cotton bur compost could potentially spread the contamination of the cotton root rot pathogin spores?

Good morning Katrina!

Cotton root rot is a fungal infection of the soil for which there is no well-known chemical treatment. It is very persistent in the soil and pretty much wiped out the cotton crop once grown in many southern states.

Millions of dollars have been spent studying it, but no real solution has been found. One researcher at Texas A&M has had some success in recent years with a combination of encapsulated (slow-release) nitrogen fertilizer in combination with certain commercial fungicides and the addition of various minerals he has found to be deficient in soil infected with cotton root rot.

One reason cotton root rot is such a problem is that it is able to lie dormant in the soil for a long time, perhaps many decades.

The best solutions are to try to acidify your soil, since it thrives in soils with a pH of 7.0 to 8.5. I have had some success in controlling it, but not eliminating it, by working large amounts of compost, peatmoss, greensand and other amendments into the soil. Using 1 lb. of ammonium sulfate per 100 square feet of soil twice annually helps, but there is no guarantee. Improving drainage also helps, but does not eliminate the fungas. I don't know if hot compost would help. I tried it one year with fresh cow manure, and all I got was every weed known to mankind. :)

One of the main treatments for cotton root rot in areas where field crops are grown is to grow various monocots, like sorghum and corn, and till them into the soil once they are mature. This seems to help slow down, but not completely eliminate, the fungal disease. It is not a practical solution for the average landscape, though.

Growing up in Texas where the main crop was once cotton, and my daddy's family were once cotton farmers, I knew all about cotton root rot long before I experienced it firsthand myself.

When I lived in Fort Worth, I listened to Neil Sperry's radio gardening show from the time he began it in the late 1970s to the time I moved here. Countless times I heard him diagnose certain types of sudden plant death as cotton root rot, and most of the time the gardeners involved simply didn't want to accept his diagnosis--I assume because none of us wants to have a disease in our gardens for which there is no simple cure!

When I began planting here and had cotton root rot problems, I was just sick about it. Over the years I have worked hard to improve the soil in the area where I have had the problems, but the cotton root rot still rears its ugly head every now and then.

With regards to composted cotton burs, I have never heard of any problems with them being a carrier of cotton root rot. As far as I understand it, the cotton root rot attacks and destroys the roots of affected plants but does not travel up into the plant system. Infected plants die because they can no longer receive nutrition via their now-decimated roots. I think it unlikely that you could ever find any trace of cotton root rot in composted cotton burrs.

Cotton is still successfully grown in the High Plains of Texas, and one of the by-products of that plant would be the composted cotton burs. I believe no one in Texas would process and sell those burs if there was any chance whatsoever that cotton root rot could be in them. One of the leading researchers in the area of Cotton Root Rot is Texas A&M University. In reading their data, I have never seen any concern expressed about cotton root rot being transferred via the burs.

Cotton root rot seems to be more of a problem in parts of Texas than in Oklahoma, but that doesn't help you if you are in the part of Oklahoma where is has reared its ugly head.

Hope this info helps.

Dawn

Good morning Dawn and Katrina.
Hey it's another great cloudy cool morning...just the kind I love to get outside and get dirty! NOT! lol

I have to tell you that every time I awoke last night my first thought was cotton root rot....ugh.

My primary concern is not particularly new planting of trees and such but how to KEEP what I already have, while I am still in the stages of trying to digest the idea that my soil may have an incurable problem. Yikes that is a discouraging thought to say the least.

One thing which stands out to me at this point is that I do have a birch tree and a Bradford pear which were both here prior to buying this propery and they have so far done well. So at least for more than the 8 years we have lived here those trees have survived. Also a circular planting of red tipped photinias and some rose of sharon which screen the utility boxes on one side of my yard due to us having two lots ajoining. Our two lots are back to back instead of side to side which makes our property deep instead of wide. And the back lot is wider than the front and is odd shaped. But that makes it rather more attractive than a straight rectangle shaped yard. If I have described this so that you can picture what I mean. haha

My point in saying all of that is...those trees and plants have survived for over 8 years so far. So is my problem only in spots? Will these trees and plants continue to live? And what of my rose bushes some of which are planted in raised beds and some are not. Best I can recall rose bushes do not have very deep roots. Do you agree with that? If they do not I am wondering if the ones in the raised beds will be safe or if I may need to dig them and make the beds deeper....oh joy....I just love that idea and so will my DH. hahaha

Dawn on your property have you found that the problem is only in certain areas? Of course your property is acres and acres and mine is around a half acre. So you have lots more room for spotty problems. And you have already mentioned that at least part of your property is sandy soil. The only place I have sand here is right around the foundation of the house. Put there by the builder to pour the foundation on of course. If you dig deep enough you get into the muck stuff at about a foot or so deep.

I think I will at least call the Noble Foundation soon and see if there is anyone there that can give me some advice and if they can help direct me to the right place to contact. At least if I can learn just exactly what I am dealing with I will know better what to even attempt to do in future and what I may expect in future regarding life expectancy of what is already here.

And please know that I reading everything you post on here and I do so appreciate all the info and help.

For right now I am feeling a little overwhelmed...not having ever heard of cotton root rot before yesterday...haha.

It is me again. I did call Noble Foundation today and had a nice long chat with a very nice man there. He says there is lots of cotton root rot problems all around this area so I certainly could be encountering problems there. He says it is mostly found in heavy clay or soils with poor drainage.

He says that you can send the roots of a dying plant(before it is actually dead) or tree to OSU for testing.

But he gave me lots of hope in spite of the possibility that I have this problem.

He says the main key to dealing with it is ELEVATION. Raising your trees or planting beds...with raised beds, berms, or terracing. Using good quality top soil and keeping everything good and healthy.
He says even the trees which are in the native soil may do just fine as long as we can keep them healthy. But a stressed tree or plant will succomb very quickly.

He gave me lots of great ideas for future plantings...just what my DH didn't want me thinking of. LOL.

He also said any tree needs to have a 6 foot diameter circumfernce area around all trees which is free of any bermuda grass or weeds! He says that is key to keeping trees healthy in our climate. Again poor DH...we need to remove some grass from around some of our trees.

We talked about the top soil which we are using and he said it was pretty good soil. But he said the very best is river or creek bottom soil. Does anyone have a creek I can get some dirt from? hahaha.

All in all I am so happy that I went ahead and called him. He was very helpful and in no hurry to end the phone call. I feel more hopeful about the entire situation after talking to him. And he told me I could call him again anytime if I have further questions.

So now I can be pretty sure I do have the problem but even without knowing of the CRR I knew that raised beds and berms was the only way to go here due to the lousy soil.

When I told the guy where we used to live he asked why on earth we had moved....I told him it had to have been temporary insanity. hahaha. He knows the soil out there and how great it is! Now I want to go buy my old house back! lol.

So again many thanks to you Dawn for all this info you have given me. You really know your stuff and I am truly impressed with your knowledge. Thanks to you Katrina and all who have offered help and suggestions on the soil topic. And I know I will have more questions before long....lol.

And now unfortunatly I need to make a walmart run.....ugh.
See you all later.

Thanks for your response and thoughts Dawn.

And good news, merryheart, a half acre lot, with a some of it taken up by the footprint of the house, seems to be a reasonalble sized area to work.

The question about the birch tree, depends on what cultivar it is. Although most Oklahoma, successfully grown birch trees thrive well in clay soils. They seem to like the moisture clay soils hold onto for so long.

In the hot humid and dry periods the 'Heritage' river birch seems to be most successful. I am not sure of which white barked birch trees handle the above described stressful conditons as well

If those trees of yours have survived for 8 years already, it is unlikely that they would suddenly, now begin to show problems from the described cotton root rot fungus.

Are you sure the pear is a Bradford cultivar? Here, once the Bradford's get to be a nice size they start experiencing severe, branch failure. If yours were a Bradford it would likely already be displaying some branch failure symptoms. You might instead have a Cleveland pear, an Aristocrat or other such less branch failure prone, ornamental pear cultivar.

As for the soil description, Muck, by that do you mean that when you pick up a handfull of that muck it feels slick and even kind of sticky? Or when you step into it do your shoes tend to almost and sometimes do remain in the wet clay after you have tried to step out of it?

With a hot dry summer, does your clay soil turn brick hard to the point where a pick ax is needed just to break it up and dig a hole and where sudden and heavily applied surface water pools or flash floods off? At such times watering other than using a soaker hose or receiving long slow durations of gentle rain periods; would deprive many types of trees from getting the high amounts of moisture they need in such dry conditions.

If those are the symptoms found on your lot just beneath the 4 to 6 inch topsoil and you do not want to go to the trouble to install proper drainage systems, then to make a garden why not install a "Lasgnia garden?" simply google search details on how easy those gardens are to make, and info on how well they produce.

Other wise, I hope your house is elevated enough for the moisture retaining soil not to cause problems if your builder installed foundation duct work instead of a less efficient, ceiling duct work system. If not and depending on how well the lot slopes you may still be forced to, in time, install a good drainage system both around the house and your gardens or landscaping.

Before choosing to install a well designed drainage systen around your house, the flexible extensions to be attached onto the bottoms of your downspouts often times is an easy and less expensive way to keep excessive rain water that my be rushing off your roof from collecting both around and underneath your foundation.

In the dry soil summer times, a soaker hose used properly around your foundation can help prevent the base clay soil from shrinking so badly and stressing the foundation of your house

We have already installed French drains in the front yard of our house and no water pools around our foundation at all. We have excellant guttering all around our house. So that is not a concern at all. Our duct work is in the ceiling much to my cold feet's discomfort...haha.
We have a lot of slope to our property and water seems to be running off naturally really well now.

The soil is not soft or squishy EVER...it is HARD HARD HARD all the time even soaking wet it is hard.
It is black clay and is common around this area. Different from the red clay...and I think much worse.

I did not plant our Birch tree so I do not know it's exact name but it is a River Birch and it's leaves start to drop in the summer unless it is kept well watered.

I assumed the pear is a Bradfor pear as the plats for this addition called for each home to have Bradford pear and Red Oaks planted. So far we have not had branch failure but many of the same trees in our neighborhood have lost branches or even toppled over. We will have to take the tree out soon in any case as it is almost blocking our back entrance where we bring our 5th wheel home.

When we water we always use soaker hoses or run the water at a slow trickle for hours at a time to get a good deep watering. Fast watering is never as effective for sure. We have soaker hoses all the way around the foundation of the house also which we use in summer to keep it damp and help protect our foundation.

All of our raised beds for flowers and veggies are based on the lasagna layering method. They have worked out wonderfully for us. And I found most of my info on the Garden Web forums but also did Google searches.

I am not sure you understood me when I said that our soil is poorly drained. I didn't mean that we actually have a drainage problem where water collects and stands in pools. It did that in the front of our house when we first bought it and that is why we had a landscape company come and install drains. It was the slope of the land which was causing most of that however and we had to have some of the front yard contured differently.
I just mean that the soil itself is poor and tightly compacted and is horrible stuff. Muck may not be a proper description. Perhaps half rock and half black clay would fit better....LOL. I wouldn't really call it moisture retaining soil either though. I have seen some of that around this region but that is not the kind of soil we have here.

We really don't have any problems with our house or drainage or ductwork or anything....thank GOD! We just have really crappy soil which apparently even may have a fungus...hahaha. But I LIKE planting in raised beds and berms anyway so it is not as big as problem as I feared. We will just continue doing that when we do new plantings. IF we do any new plantings at all that is...DH may just say NO....lol lol...and I don't really blame him if he does.

Well I have been on here a long time now and it is time to get off and get my body into a different position for a while.
So you all have a great evening. And let's hope for some gardening weather SOON.
G. M.

Hi G.M. and Katrina,

G.M., the cotton root rot I have encountered so far is in all the wrong places. It is close to the vegetable garden and close to my cottage-syle border that surrounds the veggie garden. It is close to my fruit trees and close, though not terribly so, to my roses, which are mostly in raised beds elevated six to eight inches above the surrounding grade. My roses have grown quite well, so I think yours will also. As you have stated, roses are not terribly deep rooted. I think, though, that roses prefer excellent drainage, do they not???

The cotton root rot I've encountered is in some of my better draining clay and sandy-clayey loam, not in the worst clay I have. Doesn't that just figure? On the other hand, I haven't planted much in my worst clay, just blackberries, daffodils, daylilies, American Crossvine, Orange and Yellow Trumpet Creeper, Redbud, bluebonnets, alliums, and poppies.

I did improve that clay before planting them all 7 years ago, but haven't given it much attention since.

I could have cotton root rot all over my property, but I don't think so because the native trees (oaks of all kinds, pecans, hickories, etc., etc., etc.) grow like crazy with no help from me. Also, I haven't tried to plant anything in those wooded ares, only in the more open areas closer to the house.

I am glad you called the Noble Foundation guy. I felt like they would know all about CRR since they study Oklahoma agricultural and horticultural practices so much! Well, and not to mention the fact that they have facilities in Carter County close to you and in Love County close to me.

If your trees have survived for 8 years, I think they are probably safe at this point, but there is no guarantee.

And, since cotton root rot can spread from the roots of one infected plant to the roots of another infected plant, I think in the future you should probably plant new trees far enough away from one another that the disease can't spread from one tree's roots to another's, if you know what I mean.

And, I already made the Wal-Mart run today. How would they stay in business without us?

Katrina, from the depth of your knowledge about soil improvement and drainage issues, I'm guessing you have had a lot of experience with both. Thanks for sharing with us. :)

Dawn

Dawn
How interesting and how odd that you had some of the worst problems in your better soils. The guy from NF said it is much more likely to show up in poor soils....like mine.
But he did also say that healthy plants may not ever succomb to it. He says is so prevelant around here that most areas may have some of it! So lots of people probably have it show up at times and never know what the problem is. But that could be why your native trees do well and have never succombed to it....they are just happy, healthy trees. Do you think?
He compared it to humans who get all weak and run down from working too hard or too long hours and end up catching some kind of bug...he said it just like that with trees and plants succombing to the CRR. As long as they are healthy they are fine but if they get too stressed for some reason then they might rapidly be over taken by the fungus.

I totally agree that if I do any new tree plantings I will keep them away from the areas where I have had the problems. Or be sure I plant much higher to keep them away from the bad stuff. He told me some good ideas for ways to do it.

Yes you are right on....rose bushes are VERY particular about having wet feet...they do not like wet feet at all and it will kill them quickly if they are not in well drained soil.

Hey according the weather report I heard just now we can expect some spring weather soon....then a dip in temps this weekend again but going back into 70's. I am READY. More than ready for it to get warm and stay that way.

We were camping at the lake about this same time last year and it got to 102 one of the days we were there! Far different from this year. And I sure hope we don't get that kind of heat this year but I am so tired of this cool stuff. It seemed very cold today to me out in that wind. I hope it doesn't get down too cool again tonight.

Well I am sleepy as can be tonight so I am gonna get to bed.

G. M.

Katrina

I just read back over my post from earlier today and I thought I sounded a little....well not like I wanted to sound. So I hope my post didn't make you feel put off. I didn't mean to sound snippity or anything.

The pain levels were pretty high today...if any of the rest of you have chronic pain issues?

Just wanted you to know I appreciate all the info you were giving me. I am not a very good gardener at all and am constantly needing advice in one area or another.

So I appreciate all the help and advice I can get.
Good night.
G. M.

G.M.,

LAST APRIL'S HEAT: I remember that heat wave well! DH and I were just discussing it Sunday or Monday, remembering that our volunteer fire department was working a multi-vehicle fatality accident on I-35 in front of the WinStar Casino and the heat was just brutal.

Our firefighters were out there for three or four hours. The heat and sunlight were unrelenting. I took two huge coolers full of bottled Gatorade and bottled water, and 3 gallons of sweet tea. It was a challenge to get enough fluid in everyone to keep them functioning. I think that was the worst heat I EVER remember having in April

COTTON ROOT ROT: It puzzled me that I encountered the cotton root rot in my 'better' soil too. We had just moved here and I had just started planting stuff. Naturally I started with the best soil I had. And, even though I enriched the soil a little, I think it takes years of continual soil building to improve soil enough to make a big difference.

OUR SOIL: Our land was former farmland that had lain fallow since the early 70s, I think, although it had been leased out part of those years for cattle grazing. It was fairly overgrazed when we bought it. The soil was just so depleted of nutrients and organic matter that anything I planted was under stress from day one. Also, we were having our usual summer drought. :(

I did the Mason jar soil test, and even my "best" soil was mostly sand and silt or sand and clay and had almost NO organic material in it. So, considering all that, it is probably a wonder that I didn't lose every single thing I planted in those early years.

I probably have CRR everywhere in my bad red clay soil, but I don't really plant anything in that red clay without building a berm or raised bed on top of it, so I may never know.

I had black muck clay in Fort Worth and I agree that is it probably worse than red clay. The red clay seems more fertile. You know, if you add enough organic material to the red clay you can end up with some wonderful soil for gardening. With the black clay it seems harder to achieve long-lasting improvement.

COLD WEATHER HERE & MORE IS COMING: It felt cold to me all day yesterday too, so I left everything covered up. Today I have carried everything outside that was inside for a few days, and have uncovered the TOPS of the rows of tomato cages that are wrapped in plastic. With some very cold nights in the forecast for the weekend, I am going to leave the plastic around the cages all week, and just open up the top for ventilation. There is no way I am going to take off all that plastic before I am sure we aren't going down into the 30s again.

NO DAMAGE: Everything came through the cold spell just fine. Now if we can just avoid the severe thunderstorms and tornadoes that the Weather Channel guys said might move across TX and OK later in the week.....

Dawn