"Kansas farmers intend to sow a record 130,000 acres this spring, up 40% from last year, according to USDA. It's almost 100,000 acres more than what farmers grew in 2016. While Kansas is part of a larger trend toward cotton -- acreage is expected to grow 7% to 13.5 million acres -- farmers say it's more than a one-hit wonder.
"I really think for us, cotton is here to stay," Reiss said.
COTTON'S RISE STARTS WITH DECLINING WATER
Cotton became fashionable in Kansas in the early 2000s. Water levels in the Ogallala Aquifer were falling, and farmers realized cotton could pencil in a profit.
"Cotton takes about a third of the water as corn to produce the same amount of revenue in most years," Jerry Stuckey, a cotton farmer and manager at Northwest Cotton Growers Co-op Gin, told DTN. "It's more water efficient, as far as dollars per inch of water."