What Is the Cotton Valley?

The Cotton Valley Group is an Upper Jurassic clastic sequence underlying much of East Texas, northern Louisiana, southern Arkansas, and southern Mississippi at depths typically between 8,000 and 12,000 feet TVD. The Cotton Valley contains stacked productive sandstones — Cotton Valley Pinnacle Reefs at the base of the section, multiple Cotton Valley sandstone members through the middle and upper Cotton Valley, and Bossier-equivalent shales above.

The Cotton Valley has been a primary East Texas gas producer since the 1970s. Modern horizontal redevelopment beginning in the 2000s, combined with slickwater fracture stimulation, has restored productivity from many older Cotton Valley vertical wells via refracs and extended commercial life of the play through the 2020s and into 2026.

Stacked Pay Context

Many East Texas mineral interests have Cotton Valley exposure stacked above and below other producing intervals:

Above the Cotton Valley: Pettit, James, Sligo (Lower Cretaceous carbonates); Travis Peak (Lower Cretaceous Hosston sand); Woodbine (Upper Cretaceous oil)

Below the Cotton Valley: Bossier shale, Haynesville Shale, Smackover Formation

For mineral owners, the practical implication is that a single section of acreage can have produced from multiple zones across nearly a century of operator history. Many Cotton Valley leases were drafted in the 1960s–1990s with vertical-only economics in mind.