Our area agriculturists of the Hill Country may seem to be some of the most easily spoiled folks that we may happen to know. Here we are merely a bit over a week’s lapse from the best rain of the year and we find ourselves remarking as to how dry it is out in the pastures and fields. This humble scribe will be one of the first to attest to being so very thankful for the good rain, recently, as well as quietly admitting that we could surely use another fairly soon. At the time this article is being put to paper, we have an even percentage chance of rain the next couple of days, so I’d guess we’ll all be keeping our fingers crossed.

The recent rainfall has been of great benefit to all the folks in

the pasture, orchards, and bottoms, as well as the yard & garden masters. Besides the normal cultural activities in the Pecan orchards & native bottoms, we are at that time of the season when most of the producers are talking to each other of their results of scouting efforts & reports of the Pecan Nut Casebearer. As usual, some of the scouting reports from those folks down South of us start ringing the bell and get all our folks on edge a bit early. That does give us the advantage of getting lined up fairly early, which is a lot better than being too late. As far as moth trapping goes, they did seem to appear in the orchards a good bit earlier this season. Some producers up River even had reports of egg laying this past weekend of a level that should warrant spraying. However, some of the most experienced IPM scouts around the County & closer to town, are still finding very few eggs compared to the number of nut clusters inspected. It would behoove producers to do a good job of scouting their own orchards, as there could be a difference of levels of infestation between different orchards , even if they might be just across the road from each other. Several reasons might be listed for that, a few of which would include different management programs, soil types, elevation, and certain varieties have different maturity stages of the clusters of nutlets. Anyhow, some have already been spraying , while some have their equipment ready to begin. Whether you decide to put on a biotic or an insecticide, it might help to network on the information at hand with fellow producers as well as your local County Extension office. Most of us that have been in the business several years have always felt that one might get a loner residual effect from their 1st generation spray application if they use Nufilm spreader sticker in their spray mix. Homeowners might want to think about spraying their yard trees later in the week or over the weekend which should hit it about right as far as what I’ve seen from scouting reports around Town. Don’t forget to add your Zinc as well, and I’ll leave you on your own in respect to fungicide application, as I don’t think we’ve had enough "wetting hours" to warrant that for the 1st generation application.

A couple of nice notes has come into the "News" recently regarding "Highlights" from reader comments. I do have a new rain gauge for Clay, our neighbor to the West on the Spivey down at the Colony. It appears that his ol’ gauge might have cracked during the winter ice storm. Also, a note from a visitor we had in San Saba several years back that came over from Munich to visit Texas and just so happened to choose San Saba to visit from what she picked up off the "News" web page.

Anyhow, good to hear from Petra and hope the movie & video production business is going well. It’s also nice to know that our hometown "News" has international coverage. The Mayor & yrs. truly have always realized the

importance of our Fair Valley of the Pecan everywhere out around—Harkeyville!!!!!!!!!!!