'King Cotton' toppled: Low prices force farmers to change crops

June 1, 2015 at 1:00 a.m. | Updated June 1, 2015 at 12:45 a.m.

by The Commercial Appeal

Mississippi farmer Pat Woods' 1080 acres of cotton rows are sprayed with a blend of herbicides, near Byhalia Friday afternoon. Woods' cotton plants are running roughly two weeks behind schedule due to saturated fields. In Mississippi, like several other southern states, the decline of cotton farms has reached an all-time low, with the fewest number of acres planted since the Civil War.
Mississippi farmer Pat Woods' 1080 acres of cotton rows are sprayed with a blend of herbicides, near Byhalia Friday afternoon. Woods' cotton plants are running roughly two weeks behind schedule due to saturated fields. In Mississippi, like several other southern states, the decline of cotton farms has reached an all-time low, with the fewest number of acres planted since the Civil War.

Cotton's unraveling

Farmers have indicated they'll be planting far fewer acres of cotton this year. The projected acreage totals for five Mid-South states, and the percentage decline from 2014, are as follows: Arkansas: 203,000 acres (39.4 percent decrease) Louisiana: 140,000 acres (17.9 percent decrease) Mississippi: 368,000 acres (13.5 percent decrease) Missouri: 192,000 acres (23.3 percent decrease) Tennessee: 176,000 acres (35.9 percent decrease) Source: National Cotton Council

MEMPHIS -- For the first time in more than three decades of farming, David Ciarloni will be able to look out over the fields he's cultivating this year without seeing a single cotton plant.

A 55-year-old farmer who works 950 acres in Shelby and Fayette counties, Ciarloni decided the low price he stood to receive for cotton wouldn't be worth the cost and effort involved in growing it.

"It hurt," he said of the decision. "I'm a cotton-farmer. Year in and year out, cotton was the thing that carried us through."

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