Farmer Roy's Random Thoughts - I never said it was easy.

[Chae1]

Hi
Dunno if you read a previous post, but "bale" means something very specific in cotton & is the unit of measurement that is used to determine yield & for marketing / selling. A "bale" of cotton is 227kg ( or 500 US pounds ) of ginned cotton after seeds & trash removed. After ginning it is baled into square bales about 1.5m x .8m x .9m, held with steel straps. That's what we then market.

The round "modules" of wrapped cotton that the picker produces that you see in the videos are about 1.8m high x about 2m. They weigh about 2 tonne & are roughly equal to 4 x 227kg bales of ginned cotton

Must save a lot of work wrapping it and dropping then like that. Farmer I worked for in Texas grew cotton and they did it old way with boll buggy etc.

 

[Farmer Roy]

Must save a lot of work wrapping it and dropping then like that. Farmer I worked for in Texas grew cotton and they did it old way with boll buggy etc.

Yeah, with the basket pickers there was lots of labour & machines involved.
A four row picker generally needed 2 module builders & a boll buggy to keep it going.
A 6 row round picker can work all day with 1 man . . .

 

[glasshouse]

Its a pity jon deere dont make a round baler that size

 

[Doc]

@glasshouse were you 'cotton chipping'?. Worst school holiday work we did - hoeing out burr from cotton rows between collarenebri and Moree by hand. I'm sure there is a machine for it now. Hot and boring, the occasional eastern brown used to provide some excitement though. Maybe just before your time there.

 

[glasshouse]

@glasshouse were you 'cotton chipping'?. Worst school holiday work we did - hoeing out burr from cotton rows between collarenebri and Moree by hand. I'm sure there is a machine for it now. Hot and boring, the occasional eastern brown used to provide some excitement though. Maybe just before your time there.

No, chipping was reserved for the locals.
I did spraying and logistics.
There were teams of tractors on interrow cultivation.

 

[Farmer Roy]

@glasshouse were you 'cotton chipping'?. Worst school holiday work we did - hoeing out burr from cotton rows between collarenebri and Moree by hand. I'm sure there is a machine for it now. Hot and boring, the occasional eastern brown used to provide some excitement though. Maybe just before your time there.

haha - my introduction to the cotton industry was burr chipping. Id just returned from 3 yrs in the UK & looking for something. Good money, kept you fit & we knocked off at 2.00pm ( due to heat ) so had rest of afternoon free

directed shielded spraying, precise inter row cultivation with the adoption of auto steer, & finally RR cotton have pretty much put an end to chipping, along with the high cost of labour of course

 

[Kiwi Pete]

haha - my introduction to the cotton industry was burr chipping. Id just returned from 3 yrs in the UK & looking for something. Good money, kept you fit & we knocked off at 2.00pm ( due to heat ) so had rest of afternoon free

directed shielded spraying, precise inter row cultivation with the adoption of auto steer, & finally RR cotton have pretty much put an end to chipping, along with the high cost of labour of course

Good to see things moving forwards!
Had to have a bottle of suds at lunchtime today nice and warm here.
Glad to get the cattle weighed early in the day.
Perfect day for spraying really, but bashing clods for the neighbour with the aircon blasting suits me well

 

[Farmer Roy]

ahh, tractor driving ( with auto steer ) equals lots of mobile data useage & forum commenting

 

[Farmer Roy]

although, raining here today so in theory Im tidying my desk / office & then doing my BAS.

the reality is slightly different

 

[Kiwi Pete]

although, raining here today so in theory Im tidying my desk / office & then doing my BAS.

the reality is slightly different

Reality eh?

 

[CornishTone]

although, raining here today so in theory Im tidying my desk / office & then doing my BAS.

the reality is slightly different

Raining again?! You’re being bloody spoilt you are!!!

 

[Farmer Roy]

our rainfall is summer dominant
one of the reasons we are such a strong summer crop area

 

[CornishTone]

So what’s the split between summer and winter rainfall?

 

[Farmer Roy]

http://www.weatherzone.com.au/climate/station.jsp?lt=site&lc=55202

 

[Farmer Roy]

 

[CornishTone]

Almost the polar opposite to ours. We get circa 500mm/yr.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

I haven't got a fancy graph
I do have a nice climate though!

Might be a bit cool for you jokers

 

[Farmer Roy]

freakin cold id say

 

[Kiwi Pete]

freakin cold id say

Horrible

 

[Farmer Roy]

our extremes are much greater than yours