Photo Gallery: Cotton harvest from above (photo gallery)

Ed Phillips, Delta Farm Press

Nov. 9, 2011

The setting: Heaton Farms at Lyon, Miss. — operated by Cliff Heaton.
Heaton Farms managers Brian Fyfe and Freddie Gordon helped set up the shots.
Five cotton pickers (three 2010 model Case IH MBX 625 pickers and two 2011 model Case IH MBX 635 pickers) move through a field in a V formation leaving a swath of picked rows in their wake.
Heaton Farms manager Freddie Gordon coordinated the pickers by radio.
Picking capacity depends on the size of the fields and the yield of the cotton. The better the cotton, the lower acres per hour.
On average, one of the pickers will pick about 6 acres per hour.
The field, harvested Oct. 12, yielded about 1,300 pounds per acre. It was planted May 8 to Deltapine 1048.
The photographer for the shoot was Johnny Jennings of Greenwood, Miss. Charles Fyfe of Clarksdale, Miss.
“I love cotton harvest time and wanted to capture what I consider the most exciting moment of cotton production,” says Darrah Parker, marketing manager for Delta Farm Press. With her is videographer Charles Fyfe.

Growing up surrounded by lush cotton fields in Coahoma County, Miss., Darrah Parker developed a life-long love for the crop. That strong attachment triggered a near-year-long process that has produced a stunning set of photographs.

“I love cotton harvest time and wanted to capture what I consider the most exciting moment of cotton production,” says Parker, marketing manager for Delta Farm Press. “Previously I have had photographs shot from the ground and from an airplane. I wanted to find just the right in-between height to capture the magnitude of five gigantic cotton pickers cutting a distinct swath through the snow white cotton.”

That ideal height put a photographer and a videographer about 65 feet in the air, at the end of the boom of a bucket truck on the turn row next to the field. (See Cotton pickers in formation)

Prints of the photographs can be ordered by contacting Johnny Jennings, (662) 299-3400, deltajjj@bellsouth.net or Darrah Parker, (662) 902-0025, dparker@farmpress.com.