If there’s one thing Mike Tate has learned in 33 years of growing cotton, it’s that “every year is different.”That’s why Tate is certain that these times, too, shall pass.Even though cotton prices are at pre-Civil War levels, even though the one-time king of Southern crops continues losing ground to grains, and even though you can hardly give away a used cotton picker, Tate believes in the U.S. cotton industry.”It’s not going to be something that changes over night. It’s going to take some time, and it’s probably not going to change until we start seeing some improvement in worldwide economies. That’s what’s going to bring demand back. Of course, the most important of those being the economy of the United States,” said Tate, who operates Tate Farms in the small Madison County community of Meridianville, along with his father Homer, brothers Steve and Jeff and cousin Pat Brown.Tate’s ability to make the most with the hand he’s been dealt recently earned him recognition as the Southeast Region winner of Farm Press Publications’ 15th Annual High Cotton Awards.Tate, along with Jason Luckey of Tennessee, Jimmy Dodson of Texas and Danny Locke of California — was to be presented High Cotton Awards at the National Cotton Council’s Beltwide Cotton Conference last month in San Antonio.The High Cotton award program strives to identify the top cotton producers in each major growing region (Southeast, Mid-South, Southwest and California-Arizona) and to share their successful production methods with the readers of Southeast Farm Press, Delta Farm Press, Southwest Farm Press and Western Farm Press. Nominees must be full-time growers who get a profitable return in one of the four Cotton Belt regions, produce cotton of consistently high quality and use environmentally sound production methods.”It’s quite an honor to receive that award,” said Mike. “I’ll be the first to say that even though the award is in my name, Tate Farms is a partnership. I’m in partnership with my father, two brothers and first cousin, and I sure wouldn’t have an opportunity to receive an award like this if it were not for them, what they contribute to it and what they allow me to do.”In 2008, Tate Farms planted 3,000 acres of cotton and averaged a little more than two bales per acre, thanks to almost a quarter of those acres being under irrigation. “As it turned out, 2008 was a good year for us,” he said. “But we’re still in the tail end of a drought that we’d been in the last three years. What was different about 2008 was the cost of inputs was so high that it took a lot of benefit away from it.”Going into 2009, it appears that input costs have come back to Earth. Unfortunately for most farmers, so have the prices. In fact, by December 2008, cotton prices had fallen to pre-Civil War levels, and grain levels were about half of what they were just a year ago. It’s a combination of events that has plenty of farmers wondering how to plan for this season.”I think most people’s decisions are somewhat yet to be determined,” said Mike. “Most people, especially in Alabama, have made pretty drastic changes in acreage, especially in 2008 with grain prices being good the way they were. Unfortunately, even the price of corn and wheat has come back down to levels where they are not as attractive as they were in 2008. The one that’s still there and still attractive at this point is soybeans. But we’re still three months away from planting time so things can still change. The general consensus is cotton acreage will probably be down again in Alabama, but probably not as much as it would have been three months ago before the grain prices started coming down.”At Tate Farms, 2,000 acres that were once in cotton are now in corn, soybeans and wheat.But even at 52, Mike Tate listens when his father, Homer, talks. And as far as Homer Tate is concerned, cotton will remain a staple at Tate Farms.”My father actually started this operation back in the ’40s, and cotton has been the crop that has brought us through the years so to speak,” says Mike. “Even now, he’ll still tell you the same thing — he will caution us greatly: ‘Don’t take the cotton acres down too much.’ He still does that. It happened just this week as a matter of fact. So, he believes in cotton, and we don’t fall too far from that. It is what has made Tate Farms what it is, and it is difficult to move away from it.”Now, Dad’s speaking from experience — some 60 years of experience,” Mike adds. “He’s seen it come and go, and so have the rest of us. We’ve seen times before when the cotton industry was facing times like this, and it’s come back from it. These times are different — I know that — but I do still have confidence that the cotton industry will be able to recover from this.”Tate looks at the efforts of Cotton Incorporated, the National Cotton Council and Cotton Council International to open up markets, particularly in China and India, and is inspired by the progress he sees being made. Still, he adds, don’t count cotton out in the U.S., either.”The market for cotton is still dominated by the U.S. economy,” Mike says. “Even though it may be processed it China, a big part of it comes back to the U.S. to be sold. You hear some people criticize the cotton industry as over-producing cotton? Well, that’s because they see that our textile industry has declined so much. And if you just look at it that way, it’s true. But the true market for cotton is still in the U.S., and even now I think you’ll still see the demand for cotton in the U.S. be 21 to 22 million bales, and we just went through a year where we didn’t produce but about 13. So the big market for cotton is still here in the U.S.”