By Todd Fitchette and Cary Blake | Western Farm Press
Continued drought in California coupled with a push to permanent crop acreage continues to take a toll on California cotton plantings.
Preliminary estimates put 2015 cotton plantings in California at about 170,000 acres, down from about 210,000 acres last year, according to Roger Isom, president and chief executive officer of the California Cotton Ginners and Growers Associations.
Isom says California’s extra-long staple (ELS) Pima cottons will command about 135,000 acres or almost 80 percent of the total. The balance will be short-staple Upland varieties. He cautions that these figures are an estimate as planting decisions are still being made.
