REGIONS AND HUMAN ECOLOGY 21 



ceptional strength. 31 The occasional overflows to which 

 the land on the three rivers mentioned is subject serve to 

 enrich the soil. Old buyers have given special names to 

 the best cotton grades. "Benders" are grown in the bends 

 of the Mississippi; "rivers," on the banks of tributaries 

 to the Father of Waters, and "creeks," along the smaller 

 streams. 32 "The size of the yield and the height and vigor 

 of the plants are exceptional." Hubbard speaks of old- 

 time photographs displayed in many cotton offices show- 

 ing a planter on horseback in his field with the animal 

 almost hidden in the foliage. 33 The Yazoo Delta has the 

 highest average yield of cotton in the Cotton Belt, 265 

 pounds to the acre. In the Delta 70 per cent of the im- 

 proved land is in cotton, 85 per cent of the farm land 

 is operated according to the plantation system, and 86 

 per cent of the farms are operated by Negro tenants. 

 The average holding is about thirty-three acres with 

 around twenty acres in cotton. The sixteen million acres 

 average about a million bales. 34 



The so-called second bottoms, which lie above over- 

 flow, produce good yields in southeastern Missouri and 

 northeastern Arkansas. Very little fertilizer is found nec- 

 essary on any of the alluvial farms. 35 The weevil has also 

 spread devastation in the alluvial valleys, playing espe- 

 cial havoc with fine delta cotton. 



The plantations in Arkansas and Mississippi are much 

 larger than those found elsewhere. The largest planta- 

 tion in the world at Scott, Mississippi, in the Delta con- 

 tains 37,000 acres. The land is flat, and the rows stretch 

 far away. One viewing the region for the first time is 



31 Hubbard, op. cit., p. 8. 82 Ibid, pp. 10-11. 



83 Loc. cit. 84 Cotton Atlas, pp. 8-12. 



35 "The Cotton Situation," p. 348. 



