86 HUMAN FACTORS IN COTTON CULTURE 



Also peculiar to the West are the hot winds which 

 become devastating enough to wilt corn in a day, turning 

 the leaves brown. Cotton offers more resistance but wilts 

 after a time under such onslaughts. In 1909 hot winds 

 are credited with reducing the yield 3 per cent of the 

 average of the whole belt, which means that the localized 

 damage must have been very great. 



Important in connection with the late crops induced 

 by drought is the date of the first killing frost. Frost 

 destroys the late maturing bolls and thus may cause a 

 serious loss of part of the crop. The earliest frost re- 

 corded in the Cotton Belt was noted at Memphis October 

 9 and reached to the Gulf. 12 The frost damage that year 

 is estimated at 6 per cent. As a usual thing it ranks less 

 than 1 per cent. In addition to threatening western crops 

 delayed by drought, frost is apt to be severe in the part 

 of the Piedmont Plateau nearer the mountains. 



Measured by their damage to the cotton yield, exces- 

 sive rains rank next to droughts as a climatic risk of 

 production. The damage has ranked as high as 15.3 per 

 cent of a normal yield in 1919, but the average reduction 

 is between 5 and 6 per cent of the yield. The Eastern and 

 Alluvial Belts are much more apt to suffer from too 

 much rain than Texas and Oklahoma. 



The rains that cause the greatest losses in cotton 

 production come at two periods : the early rain in April, 

 May, and June, and the wet falls. A wet April, it was 

 pointed out, delays planting and causes seed to rot in 

 the ground; a wet May causes the plant to shoot up in 

 weed without sending down an adequate taproot. Conse- 

 quently, when the long, hot, dry days of midsummer 



12 Ibid., p. 36. 



