DAVENPORT, Iowa — Hyler Bracey was raised on a cotton
farm in south Mississippi.
“We had a couple hundred acres of cotton, we had six
sharecrop farmers working on the farm and we used a bunch of mules,” said
Bracey, owner of a cotton-ginning business and a John Deere tractor collector.
“Then we bought two tractors, and with just one family and us, we farmed the
land and my grandmother was also part owner of a cotton gin with other family
members.”
While Bracey was studying at college, his family asked
him to write a prospectus to sell the cotton gin.
“I discovered it was a nice money machine, so I borrowed
money to buy the gin, which cost $100,000 then and in today’s dollars would be a
half of a million dollars,” he explained.
“But the way cotton is farmed today is dramatically
different than back when I was farming,” Bracey said during a presentation at
the Gathering of the Green 2016, organized by the Deer Valley Collectors,
Illinois Valley Two-Cylinder Club, Northwest Illinois Deer Collectors and the
Northeastern Illinois Twin-Cylinder Club.
In 1794, Eli Whitney developed a hand-cranked cotton
gin.
“He was an engineering genius, and his cotton gin could
separate more seed from lint in a day than a person could do in a year,” Bracey
explained.
“A farmer and his family sitting around the fireplace at
night picking seed from lint could handle five acres of cotton,” Bracey said.
“However, the gin made it possible for a family to farm 40 to 60 acres.”
After the gin was developed, Bracey said, the constraint
was how to pick the cotton, which resulted in a great rush to develop the cotton
picker.
“John Daniel Rust invented the cotton picker, and in
1950 John Deere came out with a self-propelled cotton picker,” Bracey said. “By
1952, 10,000 machines were built, and that reduced the amount of labor for an
acre of cotton from 155 hours down to 15 hours.”
17 Million Bales
Today, U.S. farmers produce about 17 million bales of
cotton that weigh from 480 to 500 pounds on about 11 million acres, Bracey said.
Cotton is grown in 16 states with the most planted in Texas, Georgia and New
Mexico.
After cotton is planted, the seeds will sprout in four
to 10 days.
“From 32 to 38 days after planting, the plant will begin
to create squares, which turns into a bloom,” Bracey said. “The bloom stays
white one day, pink one day and red one day and then they begin to form the
boll.”
Farmers spray the cotton plants three to four times with
a growth regulator.
“This stunts the growth of the stalk, so the bush puts
all the energy into the boll,” Bracey said.
“The boll opens 100 days after planting, and in 22 to 25
weeks, you’re ready to pick cotton,” he reported. “Toward the end of September,
farmers spray a defoliate and boll opener on the plants, wait two weeks and
start picking the cotton.”
The John Deere CP690 cotton picker harvests the cotton
and makes round modules wrapped with plastic.
“The magic is that it carries one bale while it makes
the next one,” Bracey explained. “It carries the bale to the end of the row,
where it can be dropped and the picker never has to stop.”
Cotton gins begin to operate as soon as harvest begins.
“Cotton has a lot of trash in it,” Bracey said. “The
hull and boll goes in the gin to clean it and then take the seed out.”
One gin stand has the capacity to gin 1,500 pounds of
seed cotton in three minutes, he reported.
“After it goes through the gin stand, the cotton goes
through the lint cleaners,” he added.
Samples of cotton are sent to the U.S. Department of
Agriculture to be graded based on color, staple length of the fiber, tensile
strength, fiber size and uniformity.
Bracey talked about a long list of items that are made
with cotton, including common things such as clothes and bedding items, as well
as batting for car sears and furniture that is made with cottonseed.
“One 500-bale of cotton will make 313,000 $1 bills,” he
added. “Cotton creates the strength of money.”
In addition, the cottonseed is sold to producers to feed
cattle and poultry.
“Our gin sells all the cottonseed to dairy operations
and feedlots,” Bracey said.
Martha Blum can be reached at 815-223-2558, ext. 117,
or marthablum@agrinews-pubs.com. Follow her on Twitter at: @AgNews_Blum.