Abstract

Topography of the tract and the habitat of types.-Circumvented by the Veligondi Hills-that part of the Eastern Ghats bordering Nellore and the two inland districts of Cuddapah and Kurnool-by the Uppalapad Plateau which is an outspur of the Mysore Tableland in the south-west of the Kurnool District, by several bosses west of the Handri valley in the Pattikonda Taluq, by Tungabhadra in the north till Sangameswaram and the Kistna in continuation after the confluence, lies the Northerns Cottons Tract, rich in long stapled cotton, amongst the indigenous types of the Peninsula. It comprises chiefly Kurnool District excepting a portion of the Pattikonda Taluq, Cuddapah District, and a portion of Anantapur. Nandyal, Kurnool, Proddatur and Tadpatri are the important centres of the tract. According to the Report of the Indian Cotton Committee, 1919, the estimate of area and output of Northerns is 439,000 acres and 65,000 bales (each of 400 lb. of lint) respectively. But groundnut, in its expansion, taking a portion of the extent under cotton and the prohibition of rail-borne cotton from beyond Tarlupadu (on the Guntakal-Bezwada line of the M.S.M. Ry.) into the tract under the Cotton Transport Act of 1925 have reduced the acreage and output. With 50 lb. of lint as acre-yield (official average for the districts concerned), or at 8 acres for a bale of 400 lb. lint (and allowing a margin for the quantity utilized in hand-spinning), the general output of the three markets of the tract.

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