By Brad Haire
University of Georgia

Georgia cotton’s most notorious enemy, the boll weevil, was
nowhere to be found in 2003. It’s the first year this has
happened since a program began to eradicate the weevil 20 years
ago.

A year with zero boll weevils is a notable milestone, said
Phillip Roberts, a cotton entomologist with the University of
Georgia Extension Service.

“Even though the boll weevil hasn’t been of any economic
consequence for a long time,” he said, “a lot of older farmers
out there remember how bad it was. And a lot of young farmers
out there want to never know.”

Virginia, north Florida and the Carolinas also reported no boll
weevils last year, said Jim Wilson, the Southeastern Boll Weevil
Eradication Program manager.

North Carolina has had zero reports before. It’s been only in
recent years, though, that cotton states have started reporting
zero boll weevils.

Program

“It shows that the eradication program continues to work with
great cooperation from cotton states and farmers,” Wilson
said.

Farmers now take extra care to clean cotton equipment that comes
from states with reported boll weevil outbreaks, Roberts said.
This has also led to fewer reported infestations.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture and farmers started Georgia’s
eradication program in 1987. Since then, cotton farmers have
paid about $120 million for the program. They’ve produced about
$6.8 billion worth of cotton since then, too.

The boll weevil was officially considered eradicated from
Georgia in 1994. But it never completely left the state. Georgia
workers monitoring traps reported 61 boll weevils in 2002.

The mighty boll weevil jumped the Mexican border in the late
19th century. It blew into Georgia cotton fields in 1914. Until
then, cotton was king throughout much of the state.

But in seven years, the boll weevil crippled the state’s cotton
industry. It caused yields to drop dramatically. Out-of-work
cotton laborers fled the state to find jobs elsewhere.

Many farmers just quit growing cotton. They turned to other
crops like peanuts.

Farmers who kept trying to grow cotton in Georgia had to spray
for the weevil as much as 20 times a year. This only worsened
insect-control problems, since the sprays killed beneficial
insects that kill cotton pests.

With the eradication program and new genetically modified
varieties that provide their own insect control, Georgia cotton
farmers now spray only a fraction of what they used to. Last
year, Roberts said, they averaged spraying 2.5 times for insect
control.