High Plains Farmers Pivot to Long Staple Production
August 10, 2026 In cotton production, as with most jobs, it’s easy to become set in your ways. This is especially true for a producer like Carroll Leon, who planted his 45th crop this spring. If you’ve been doing something for long enough, you start to feel like you’ve got it figured out.
But amid all the turmoil of 2020, the challenging farm economy began to take a toll on cotton producers. As cotton demand slowed and input costs skyrocketed, Carroll and his son Rodney began searching for tweaks to their corn and cotton operation in an effort to claw back some profitability. That’s when the Leon family’s Nutrien representatives approached them with an unusual offering: an Upland variety that was yielding with fiber characteristics that more closely resembled ELS cotton.
Carroll and Rodney took special interest in the idea, given the economic circumstances they faced.
“DynaGro’s people contacted Rodney and said, ‘Hey, we’ve got this cotton variety that the staple is extremely long on it, and we think we can develop it and capture some of the Pima market,” says Carroll. “They asked if we would experiment with it, and so we started that first year with 30 feet. We got our planting seed in an envelope.”
The Leons saw enough in that first small trial plot to pique their interest. In 2021, the family harvested 25 acres of the long-staple variety. Every year since, they’ve increased their allotment to the effort.
“Survival was getting pretty tough in those years. We had to do something different,” Carroll says. “Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, as you know, is insanity. That was not working for us anymore.”
The new strategy has now changed their operation –— and that of the surrounding community – in extraordinary ways.
“In the past two or three years, I have spent more time on this long staple project than I have on actual traditional farming,” Carroll says.
Pivoting to long staple production in this way is no small task. While the production effort on the new long staple varieties remains generally the same, the Leons have had to reimagine how they would gin and market this new product. Those tasks have proved challenging in unique ways.
Moving at High Speed
By 2023, the Leons were growing enough high-staple cotton acres that they were having to travel to find a gin that could capably handle it. After successfully finding a market — and earning an adequate premium for their new crop – the Leons decided to go all in by 2024.
“That year we grew 1,700 acres, and the year after that we grew 2,200 acres,” Carroll says. “It’s been a continuous increase in acres as we learn what the market response has been to it.”
But something had to give when it came to ginning such a substantial amount of cotton. Traditional saw gins were shaving some of the premium off of the end product. For a while, the Leons were travelling longer distances to roller gins who had capacity for their new harvest – but that was an expensive and inconvenient option. Carroll, who sat on the Board at Peterson Co-op Gin, began to approach his fellow stakeholders about making a change.
“When Rodney and I decided to really pursue this, it became apparent that we needed to do something different, so I started trying to gather support for a new gin,” Carroll says.
Another local grower began to ramp up production on the high-staple varieties. Soon after, Petersburg Co-op Gin Manager Myles Ramsey began thinking about how he could accommodate his local producers.
“With more acres being grown in it, in the summer and fall of 2024 I had more interest in it, and we start looking at what the potential was,” Ramsey says. “To be honest, I told people we weren’t just going to build a roller gin, it was about building a market and building a premium product for these guys just so they could survive.
“It’s been very tough for everyone in the Cotton Belt to survive on the Upland prices we’ve seen, because of input costs going up so much. So that was the driving force.”
Ramsey began to consult with Lummus Ag Solutions at the end of the 2024 growing season, and by April 2025 the gin community held a ribbon cutting ceremony and broke ground on a new, state-of-the-art high-speed roller gin. By fall, the new gin was operational.
Creating a new gin was only part of the new plan, however. Carroll, Rodney, and other local growers needed to find a new market for this new product, as well. That task proved just as involved.
“2025 was a year of trying to develop markets more than anything,” says Carroll. “You can’t just put this on the Seam and sell it. You can’t just call your normal cotton buyer – they’re not interested because they don’t know what to do with it.”
Luckily, Carroll says, they’ve had some help along the way.
Plains Cotton Cooperative Association was one of the first sources of assistance with marketing a long-staple product. Along the way, Allenberg Cotton, Jess Smith and Sons and independent marketers have helped source buyers for the premium fiber the Leons have produced. “Our philosophy has always been ‘don’t put all your eggs in one basket,’” Carroll says. “That’s just good business.”
The premiums the Leons have earned have made the effort worthwhile so far.
“Today, I’ll tell you that it costs somewhere between 15 and 20 cents more per pound to grow this cotton,” Carroll says. “This year most cotton brought about 65 cents, so we were looking for around 95 cents for our long staple. And it brought about one dollar — some a little less, some a little more. So it’s holding the premium today.”
Starting with the Seed
Of course, the germplasm supplied by the seed brands has been crucial to this sea-change on the Leons’ operation. Carroll has high praise for the seed DynaGro has brought forth.
“Currently DynaGro has no competition in the staple arena,” he says. “There is no other Upland cotton that competes.”
But Carroll says other seed brands have begun to approach producers in the Petersburg area with offerings they believe could be useful in the push for longer staple. The Leons planted a small amount of Deltapine 2525 BX3F in 2025, and Carroll says he’ll increase his allotment to that variety this season. “We’re hopeful with it, but don’t have enough data just yet.”
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