Land Use Change in a Piedmont County∗

Carroll County, Georgia, is a microcosm of the southern Piedmont, where cotton has lost its former dominance. No replacement crop is available for erstwhile forty-acres-and-a-mule yeoman cottom farms that are much too small for modern agricultural technology, and only a few entrepreneurs have managed to assemble acreages large enough for successful farm operations. Much former cotton land has been abandoned to scrubby, second-growth woodland, which might well be an “acreage reserve”that could be brought back into agricultural production at such time as the United States no longer has a surplus of farm land. Some former cotton land has been bought by paper companies and planted in loblolly pine. The remaining cleared land in the county is used for pastures of highly variable quality that carry small herds of beef cattle. Poultry production, which is essentially a factory operation, provides three-quarters of all farm income, but most poultry farmers must supplement their income with off-farm jobs. Rising employment in manufacturing has absorbed much of the surplus rural labor force, which has “migrated to the blacktop”for easier commuting. Unpainted shacks on unimproved back roads have been abandoned by people who have moved to the modern rural nonfarm houses that cordon the highways. Many abandoned cotton farms are so small that city people have been able to afford to buy them as a hedge against inflation. One wooded area of 2,400 acres has been acquired for a second home/resort/retirement development that merely happens to be in the county

Agricultural economics · Agricultural science · Agriculture · Business · Dominance (genetics) · Economics · Geography · Nonfarm payrolls · Woodland · Agricultural Economics and Policy · Ecology

• World Deforestation in the Twentieth Century

  Roger A Sedjo, John F Richards et al.•Contemporary Sociology A Journal…•1989

  Incluir item

• Rural Land-Use Trends in the Conterminous United States, 1950–2000

  Open Access•David G Brown, Daniel G Brown et al.•Ecological Applications•2005

  Incluir item

• Economic critique of U.S. prime farmland preservation policies

  Open Access•Arthur C Nelson•Journal of Rural Studies•1990

  Incluir item

• Towards a theory of the American rural residential land market

  Open Access•Arthur C Nelson•Journal of Rural Studies•1986

  Incluir item

• The Exurbanization of America and Its Planning Policy Implications

  Open Access•Arthur C Nelson, Kenneth J Dueker et al.•Journal of Planning Education and…•1990

  Incluir item

• Some Devolutional Similarities to Diffusion

  Paul F Mattingly, GEORGE ASPBURY•Geografiska Annaler Series B…•1985

  Incluir item

• Large-scale farming as a cultural dilemma in U.S. rural development— The role of capital

  Open Access•Howard F Gregor•Geoforum•1982

  Incluir item

• Effects of conservation policies on forest cover change in giant panda habitat regions, China

  Open Access•Yu Li, Andrés Viña et al.•Land Use Policy•2013

  Incluir item

• Devolution of Cotton From the Piedmont

  Open Access•Paul F Mattingly, GEORGE ASPBURY•Tijdschrift voor Economische en…•1986

  Incluir item

• Land Use in the Taipei Basin

  Jack F Williams, Christopher L Sutherland et al.•Annals of the Association of…•1988

  Incluir item

• Prevailing Myths About Agricultural Abandonment and Forest Regrowth in the United States

  Navin Ramankutty, Elizabeth Heller et al.•Annals of the Association of…•2010

  Incluir item

• In Memoriam

  Katherine Klink, John C Hudson et al.•Annals of the American…•2026

  Incluir item