n addition to the chance that no cotton might be planted in Warren County in 2009, the remaining gin might be idled.

But phones are still ringing at the offices of Simmons Planting Company in the weeks after the toughest cotton-growing season on record in Mississippi ended this month.

“We’re just about done,” Dinna Simmons said. “We might have a little scrappin’ left, though.”

All of the cotton ginned in Warren County in recent years has been spun at the company’s gin on Mississippi 465 in the Eagle Lake community. Next year, however, the gin could be silent if fields along the highway traditionally dotted in white might be planted in wheat, soybeans or corn.

“It’ll probably be corn,” Simmons said.

Estimates on nationwide cotton production for this year fell to 13.5 million bales, which would be 6 million fewer than in 2007. In Mississippi, output dropped to 680,000 bales, down nearly half since a year ago.

As reported earlier in the week, county totals won’t be available from the U.S. Department of Agriculture until April. In the meantime, decisions by traditional cotton farming operations such as the one Simmons’ late husband, Crosby, ran for 20 years before she took the reins must be made.

With this year’s crop, perhaps the last, now in bales, decisions for 2009 will be based on sheer economics — with world commodity prices tied to energy trends like never before.

Once, several gins operated in the area. For several years, the gin off the state highway also known as Eagle Lake Road has been the only destination for the fibrous crop for not just Warren County, but much of the South Delta.

Fertilizer prices followed that for fuel in the past year, resulting in cotton growers paying upward of $600 per ton on commonly used nitrogen and potash. Cotton futures stood between 36 and 42 cents per pound this week, far below the $1 that most growers say is the new floor for making a profit and outpaced by rates for corn and soybeans trading at nearly $4 and $9, respectively.

“My husband always said cotton is king,” Simmons said. “But it takes more overall input to grow cotton than it does for grains.”

When costs for insecticides are thrown in the mix, it costs $425 to grow an acre of cotton, Simmons said. Even with the same economic forces at work, corn’s per-acre cost is $375. Similar costs for wheat and soybeans barely crack $100, with the science of effective growing at the heart of the matter.

“Corn and cotton have to have that nitrogen to produce,” the gin’s outgoing president, Bill Parker, said. “For cotton, it takes more fertilizer from the very beginning to grow it.”

In past years, cotton farmers could sustain profits when a pound of upland cotton went for 72 cents, Parker said.

While both assured losing the gin wouldn’t mean losing crop productivity, its income would go beyond symbolism if profits become easier in the coming years.

“If we lose the infrastructure for growing cotton, it will be much more difficult for a farmer to re-establish it,” Warren County Extension Agent John Coccaro said.

Cotton farms continued to face tough weather conditions after this spring’s Mississippi River flooding. The dwindling number of acres in Warren County developed for cotton farming had to take a bush hog to fields littered with rotted bolls due to Hurricane Gustav and Hurricane Ike, Coccaro said.

Feeder bands from the two storms drenched Vicksburg and Warren County with about a foot of rain in August, triple the normal amount.

“The land is fine, but the timing of the rain ruined it,” Todd Andrews said of his rented farm land off Mississippi 27.

Echoing criticisms of the energy futures market when gasoline prices spiked to more than $4 in parts of the country, Andrews said price speculation in commodities markets played havoc with farmers’ bottom line.

“They kept running it up and making their money on it,” Andrews said. “But, the farmer couldn’t sell any.”

News of taxpayer-funded bailouts in the financial and automotive industries evoke comments of crisis and changing times among cotton farmers — followed up by concern about where agriculture stands on the cusp of a new federal administration.

“Maybe as gas prices go down, then fertilizer will come down,” Simmons said. “But, maybe they need to bail out some of the farmers.”

This year’s Farm Bill, titled the Food, Conservation and Energy Act of 2008 set counter-cyclical payments for upland cotton. Those subsidies occur when the effective price for a commodity is less than the government-set target price. Targets for upland cotton will fall slightly, from 72.4 cents to 71.2 cents. Corn targets remained unchanged at $2.63 per bushel.

Disaster assistance programs are available for noninsured crops when actual crop production falls below 50 percent of yields or when 50 percent of inventory values are lost. Deadlines for applying for the 2009 Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program have been extended to Dec. 1, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

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Contact Danny Barrett Jr. at dbarrett@vicksburgpost.com.