Bangladesh, Oct. 10 -- Cartersville, OCT 10 (AP/UNB) - In a vast expanse of the South stretching from Texas to Maryland, there are growing concerns for the cattle, cotton and corn amid a worsening drought fueled this past summer by record high temperatures.

One of the bullseyes marking the nation's driest areas is Bartow County, Georgia, where extreme drought conditions have kicked up buckets of dust and left cattle pastures bare in farm country northwest of Atlanta. It has been among the hardest-hit areas in the more than 12 southern states where more than 45 million residents are now living in some type of drought conditions, the most recent U.S. Drought Monitor report shows.

Across the South, the drought has ravaged the pastures wher...