Lint on the Vine
The blooms on these cotton plants are rapidly turning into bolls. They are right on schedule to offer their lint to cotton pickers as big as a small house come October. The cotton rows behind stretch to a yellow soybean field nearly ready for the combine.
Monday, September 7, 2015
Pine Buff, Arkansas
Here in LA (lower Arkansas) what few cotton bolls left are beginning to pop open. Most of the gazillion acres of corn that replaced a nearly equivalent acreage of cotton have been harvested. The hummingbirds are beginning to gorge for their egress from this territory. On Friday and Saturday nights, fans are flocking to gridiron battles.
Another View
Here’s a second look at neighboring plants to those above at a lower angle.
All of the above means that fall is itching in the starting gate while summer is tenaciously scratching and clawing to hang in there for a few more 90/90 days (90 degrees, 90% humidity). It is a time to observe the early throes of seasonal transition. And so we shall.
Showing Their Stuff
These cotton plants are beginning to show their stuff. Once planters are convinced that all of the bolls that will produce lint have opened, they will defoliate the cotton plants in preparation for the hungry jaws of the giant pickers.
Cut, Sucked, Stripped, Smashed, Spit
This combine, rigged to harvest corn, is nearing the end of rows which appear precariously close to U.S. Highway 65 just north of Tamo, Arkansas. The long lens is fooling you. The cornfield ends about 50 yards from the highway. In a couple of heartbeats, the remaining stalks in front of the combine will be cut, sucked into the maws of the machine, stripped of their corn, smashed to smithereens, and spit out the back.
Turning, Turning
The combine has turned to make a cut through its next rows of corn. See the spit?
Time for the Transfer
Once the combine hopper is full, it disgorges its golden contents to a cart for transfer to a semi, which will carry it to a storage bin or elevator. Sooner or later, most of the corn grown in these environs is pounded into chicken feed.
Peek-a-Boo
A few kernels are playing peek-a-boo in this corn patch, which is ready for the combine.
Life Force at Work
In the harvesting process, a few kernels of corn are left behind. After a short while, they do their genetically imbued thing and attempt to make more corn. It is said, the sandy loams of the Delta are so rich, one could throw a handful of ball bearing in a field and in a couple of days, they’d sprout.
Face of the Utilitarian
Soybeans ready for harvest are ugly little varmints. Their beauty is not aesthetic, but utilitarian.
In a month or two, Mother Nature’s transition will be nearly complete. I say nearly because in LA, the old girl will sometimes drag her feet and not complete the job until December. No complaint, just a mere observation.
But wait, there's more —
A swing through the Delta
always produces more than you went for.
See the non-crop pictures from this trip,
including this old John Deere A tractor at
Weekly Grist for the Eyes and Mind.
Click, go, observe, and see the good stuff.
