Cotton Seed Distributors - Web on Wednesday

Nick Mahony, General Manager, Australian Classing Services, Wee Waa, reports on the positive indications of quality results achieved so far this season 

Nick could you make some general comments on the quality of the cotton that you’ve received so far this season, particularly in relation to leaf this season?

To date, we’ve classed approximately 33,000 bales from the various valleys from Central Queensland, a little bit from the Macintyre Valley, Mungindi area, the Macquarie and Hillston and we’ve only just started to see a little bit of cotton come in from the Namoi Valley and Gwydir Valley and also a fraction from out around Bourke. To date the leaf has been quite good. Most of the leaf has fallen within the two to three leaf range and there’s been a very small percentage generally with dryland stripper picked that’s had higher leaf grades of four or five leaf.

And I guess that’s particularly good considering how difficult defoliation has been in some crops, that’s a pretty good result?

Oh yes it’s fantastic. The first indications of what the quality has been like so far has been really positive.

What about colour? I’d imagine that wouldn’t be too bad as well?

Yes, so far we’ve had 95% of what we’ve seen has fallen within 21 or 31 colour grade. The majority of it or 63% of the 95 has fallen into 21, so colour grades have been fine this season.

And I guess your HVI reading such as strength. Any comments or any problems there?

No, strength so far has been quite good. We’ve seen 74% above 30 grams per tex. 20% has fallen between 28 to 30 grams per tex and you know with the remainder there’s been a few little patches of short stuff but nothing to worry about.

And getting onto length, in the previous seasons we have seen quite a bit of short cotton come through with the water problems we’ve had in the past few seasons. What’s the case this year?

No the staple’s been a big improvement so far. With 35 staple, which is probably the most common base grade, we’ve seen about 21% of. 36 staple 39% and 37 staple and above we’ve seen about 34%, so you know length is looking fantastic.

And the big one I guess that’s been a problem for the last few seasons has been micronaire. Any comments on how that’s been this year?

Yes the micronaire results to date have been absolutely fantastic. The premium micronaire range, which is commonly referred to as 38 to 45 where 73% of the cotton has fallen into, so it’s been a big change on the last three years. We have had a little bit of low micronaire that has shown up in Dryland or crops that have run out of water but that’s been a very small percentage.

You mentioned that you’ve done a bit of cotton from most regions now. Any major differences between the regions?

I think that the stand out region to date has been Hillston and they’ve had a really fantastic season down there. The colour is exceptional, the length is exceptional, the micronaire. I mean it’s the perfect cotton in regards to classing. Big change for Hillston, we haven’t seen quality that good and that consistent for a few years. It’s probably the best quality year they’ve had to date actually. Other areas have been quite positive; you’d probably say that they’re average to just above average to what you would expect. We’re very interested to see how the Namoi Valley and the Gwydir’s qualities come out.

And any ideas from your figures as to what percentage of the crop would be base grades, like base grades with no discounts or premium in terms of the tables received?

Probably say from base grade upwards you’re probably looking 90% or better at this point in time, but the seasons been staged very late and given whether or not we have any more rain during the pick that’s still to go will push the season out even later, so it’s probably early days still but indications are to date that most of the cotton that has been picked up to now should achieve base grade and better.

Further information:  Robert Eveleigh, John Marshall, or Craig McDonald