Texas ranked 2nd among the 50 states in agricultural production in 2001, with farm marketings totaling over $13.8 billion; crops accounted for 32% of the total. Texas leads the nation in output of cotton, grain sorghum, hay, watermelons, cabbages, and spinach.
Since 1880, Texas has been the leading producer of cotton (producing both Upland and American-Pima), which accounted for 29% of total US production and 7.3% of the state's farm marketings in 2002. After 1900, Texas farmers developed bumper crops of wheat, corn, and other grains by irrigating dry land and transformed the "great Sahara" of West Texas into one of the nation's foremost grain-growing regions. Texans also grow practically every vegetable suited to a temperate or semitropical climate. Since World War II, farms have become fewer and larger, more specialized in raising certain crops and meat animals, more expensive to operate, and far more productive.
About 131 million acres (53 million hectares) are devoted to farms and ranches, representing more than three-fourths of the state's total area. The number of farms declined from 420,000 in 1940 to fewer than 185,000 in 1978, but rose to 230,000 in 2002. The average farm was valued at $720 per acre in 2002.
Productive farmland is located throughout the state. Grains are grown mainly in the temperate north and west, and vegetables and citrus fruits in the subtropical south. Cotton has been grown in all sections, but in recent years, it has been extensively cultivated in the High Plains of the west and the upper Rio Grande Valley. Grain sorghum, wheat, corn, hay, and other forage crops are raised in the north-central and western plains regions. Rice is cultivated along the Gulf coast, and soybeans are raised mainly in the High Plains and Red River Valley.
Major crops in 2002 included: upland cotton, 4.4 million acres produced 5 million bales (valued at $919.2 million); wheat, 2.7 million acres produced 78.3 million bushels (valued at $234.9 million); hay, 5.6 million acres produced 13.9 million (valued at $930.4 million); sorghum, grain, 2.6 million acres produced 130.1 million bushels (valued at $305.9 million); corn, 1.8 million acres produced 205.7 million bushels (valued at $534.7 million); rice, 206,000 acres produced 14,616 hundred weight (valued at $61.4 million); vegetables, fresh, 91,800 acres produced 1.2 million tons (valued at $428.8 million); soybeans, 215,000 acres produced 6 million bushels (valued at $31.3 million).
The major vegetables and fruits, in terms of value, are onions, cabbages, watermelons, carrots, potatoes, cantaloupes, green peppers, honeydew melons, spinach, cucumbers, and lettuce. Cottonseed, barley, oats, peanuts, pecans, sugar beets, sugarcane, and sunflowers are also produced in commercial quantities.
The total value of farmland and buildings alone was estimated at $94.3 billion in 2002, higher than any other state.
Irrigated farmland in 1997 totaled 5.4 million acres (2.2 million hectares), of which about 65% was in the High Plains; other areas dependent on irrigation included the lower Rio Grande Valley and the trans-Pecos region. Approximately 80% of the irrigated land is supplied with water pumped from wells. Because more than half of the state's irrigation pumps are fueled by natural gas, the cost of irrigation increased significantly as gas prices rose during the 1970s.