DATE: Thursday, November 20, 1997           TAG: 9711200436

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY LINDA McNATT, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: SUFFOLK                           LENGTH:   81 lines

RAINS DAMPEN ALREADY WILTED PROFITSSUFFOLK'S LOSSES ARE APPROACHING $8 MILLION, AN EXTENSION AGENT TELLS THE CITY COUNCIL.

Local farmers' summer-long prayers for rain must have reached the nimbus clouds that finally poured forth at the harvest.

Drought, farmers say, spoiled much of the crop this summer.

But now, autumn rains are soaking the cotton. The quality of the lint deteriorates, and the price falls with every drenching.

Virginia Tech extension agent Clifton Slade told the Suffolk City Council recently that farmers have lost nearly $8 million this year on corn, peanuts, cotton and soybeans because of the drought.

That's a big bite out of the more than $45 million farming typically brings in.

On Wednesday, Gov. George Allen requested a damage assessment report for the city, part of the process for attaining federal disaster designation. That could make low-interest loans available to Suffolk farmers.

Rains that have soaked the area in late October and early November have damaged the cotton crop even more and prevented harvest.

Fields that normally look white and fluffy this time of year look ``brown and drippy,'' one local farmer said.

``Some fields even look like they've already been picked - and they haven't,'' said Betty Gray, a laboratory specialist at Virginia Tech's Tidewater Agricultural Research Station in Holland. ``The cotton is just kind of soaked and falling out of the bolls.''

Gray, who collects weather statistics for the center, said the autumn deluge started in mid-October. Still, the 2.89 inches of October rain was under the monthly average of 3.41 inches and didn't do serious damage to the cotton.

By the end of the month, the 29.97 inch total for the first 10 months of the year was under the normal average of 38.47 inches.

But, in early November, just as farmers were starting to harvest cotton, the weekends turned wet. In 19 days 4.97 inches of rain fell. November's average is 3.12 inches. More showers are expected this weekend.

In Suffolk and Isle of Wight County, the state's two largest cotton-producing areas, a little over 50 percent of the harvest has been completed. Each area grows about 14,000 acres. Leaving the crop in the fields is affecting its price.

``The rain has deteriorated the quality substantially,'' said Rick Ludwig, manager of the Suffolk Cotton Gin. ``The quality and the color is deteriorating as it sits in the fields.''

Every time cotton gets wet, it gets a little darker. Sun for a week and a half or two weeks would bleach it white again. But farmers this month haven't had the benefit of a stretch of sunshine. And every time cotton dries after a soaking, it is lighter in weight. That's because the rain washes away some of the lint.

The effect so far has been about $40 less per bale than last year when a bale - which weighs about 550 pounds - brought $350.

It's having an effect on the cotton gin as well, Ludwig said. The gin isn't nearly as busy as it should be this time of year. Farmers who should be finishing the cotton harvest, are barely in the middle of it.

Bad luck has definitely marked the cotton crop of 1997, but, by far, it has done better than most other crops, said Robert Goerger, Va. Tech extension agent in Isle of Wight County.

``The loss in weight and quality from the rain is minor in comparison to what we lost in the drought,'' he said. ``It's certainly had a negative impact, and, with more rain, it could be even worse. But we're still going to make a lot more money on cotton than we've made on corn.''

If anything, Goerger said, the unpredictable weather this year will likely sway area farmers to plant even more cotton next year.

Slade agreed. Corn was a disaster, he said. The peanut harvest reaped about one-third of what it normally would have. Farmers lost about 50 percent of the soybean crop. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

JOHN H. SHEALLY II/The Virginian-Pilot

Fields that normally look white and fluffy...

Graphic

The Virginian-Pilot

CROP LOSSES IN SUFFOLK

SOURCES: Virginia Tech; City of Suffolk

[For complete graphic, please see microfilm]

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