February Newsletter

Welcome to the February Northern Cotton update.

We hope everyone has been able to enjoy some well-earned downtime over the Christmas period and we wish everyone a prosperous 2026.

As 2026 begins, it brings with it fresh and exciting opportunities for all of us. It’s pleasing to see that many growers are looking to introduce a rotation crop into their cotton production systems with sorghum emerging as a popular choice.

Northern Cotton sees this as an opportunity to expand our service offerings, and we are in the final stages of developing a business case for submission to our Board and Shareholders for investment consideration in mid-February.

A two staged development is proposed with stage 1 comprising 2 x 286 MT cone bottom fumigation and aeration silos with an elevated above ground hopper and hydraulic container tilt to facilitate high speed container packing. Stage 2 will include the addition of 2 x 2,000 metric ton flat bottom silos to handle the increased volumes of grain production we expect in coming years.

The investment at the site will provide growers with access to an export market and ensure that growers returns are maximised for the commodities they produce. A draft plan for the complex is shown below, and construction is proposed to be completed during the third quarter of 2026.If you have any questions, please call Tony Geitz 0457 350 221.

CSD UPDATE

Alex Roughly

Northern Territory and Western Australia

Planting commenced in the Northern Territory for the 2026 cotton season with the first seed going in the ground on the 10^{th of} December, with an anticipated 6000 hectares to be planted across the NT. Planting was slow to begin with due to wet conditions in parts of the Douglas Daly region and extremely dry conditions in the Southern end of the Douglas Daly region and Katherine. As conditions improved moving into the second half of December planting operations were in full swing, with the majority of the NT’s rainfed crop planted by the second week of January. A small area of irrigated cotton grown under pivots was also planted during the second half of January. This season has seen the NT leading the way with the adoption of Bollard 3 Xtendflex varieties with large plantings of Siokra 253B3XF and Sicot 619B3XF as growers recognising the benefits of utilising Glufosinate as an over-the-top herbicide as part of the weed control program.

Throughout the planting period conditions have for the most part been favourable with regular rain events allowing ideal establishment conditions. At the time of writing the NT has avoided most of the flooding and extended periods of monsoonal weather allowing ideal growth and development conditions with the earliest plantings reaching squaring with minimal setbacks. No doubt the NT industry will be looking for favourable conditions to continue as we progress through the rest of the wet season.

One of the first CSD trials to be planted this season is a row configuration/planting density trial supported by the team at Black Bull Station, in the Douglas Daly region. To assist with planting this trial CSD’s newly acquired 4 row John Deere ExactEmerge™ planter with ExactShot™ technology planter, which is the first of its kind in Australia, was transported from Dalby in Southern Queensland to the Northern Territory. The photo below shows the new planter in action completing the 60-inch (1.5 meter) row spacing part of the trial.

Further west, and in the Ord Valley Irrigation Area (ORIA) of WA ginning of the 2025 crop continues as growers start to look towards the 2026 season. To date fields have so far handled the wets season’s conditions with well-prepared beds and robust herbicide programs setting up a great foundation for the upcoming season. The Ord Valley continues this season with a 12-week planting window which opens on the 1^{st of} January. As the local industry’s knowledge and experience grows as does the fine tuning of planting dates, although as always in Northern Australia this is heavily dependent on wet weather. With this in mind, most growers had elected to hold off planting until after the Australia Day weekend to target a late January/February plant. At the time of writing in the lead up to the Australia Day weekend a small amount of irrigated cotton as well as a newly developed area planted to rainfed cotton had been planted. The Ord Valley will be looking for a few weeks of blue skies and sunshine as we move into February for an anticipated 10000 hectare plus crop in WA this season.

To assist with measuring rainfall this wet season and as part of the CSD/Sygenta fast start program, CSD maintains a network of weather stations across the cotton valleys that are available for members to access at https://tools.csd.net.au/agronomytools/weathernetwork

Alex Roughley, CSD E&D Agronomist - NT and WA