Since I missed blogging yesterday, I'm posting two pictures today. Cotton is one of the "5 Cs" in Arizona (copper, cattle, citrus, climate/tourism and cotton) that played a major role in the state's economy from roughly 1950-1970. Today, the citrus groves, cotton fields and dairy farms are giving way to tract homes for Intel and Motorola employees.Queen Creek, however, has quite a few cotton fields, at least for now. The first photo is a close-up I took about a month ago. The second photo shows a full plant. I was surprised to see that there are pods on a cotton plant that apparently bloom a pinkish flower before going to seed and producing cotton. On the plant in the second photo, you can see all three stages: pod, flower and cotton.
I'm going to try to get out in the next few days to take a photo of the fields now, almost completely gone to seed. The fields are white with cotton, and I'm expecting they'll harvest the cotton any day now.
I'm glad to see they are still growing cotton on the farms around there. What a shame to lose all of our produce fields to tract homes.
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