Florida planters cultivated both short staple and Sea Island cotton.
The most common varieties of short staple cotton grown through-
out the Lower South were Green Seed, Mexican, Petit Gulf, and
Mastadon. ¹ Florida growers preferred the Mexican to other "short"
cotton seed. Under favorable conditions, it yielded about 1,500
pounds of cotton to the acre. In other areas, the yield was not so
great; in the fertile black belt of Alabama, yields of 800 to 1,000
pounds of short staple per acre were obtained. In the less fertile
South Carolina Piedmont, 100 to 300 pounds was considered aver-
age. In 1852, J. D. B. De Bow estimated that the average yield for
the South was 530 pounds of short staple, or seed cotton, per acre. ²

Cotton growers in Florida soon discovered that the soil was
especially suited for the growth of Sea Island cotton. It was superior
to the short staple, and, because of the length of its fiber, it was used
for the finest fabrics and sewing thread. French manufacturers
used it to adulterate their silk fabrics. Though the Sea Island variety
required more space for cultivation and took about four weeks
longer to mature, its market price per pound was about twice that
of short staple. Hardy Bryan Croom, the noted Florida botanist and
owner of Goodwood Plantation in Leon County, Florida, wrote in

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