To help cotton growers capture, store and retrieve information about their crop for use by the gin, John Deere has introduced Harvest Identification, Cotton
The system eliminates manual tagging of modules, provides on-the-go documentation, simplifies record keeping, and improves tracking and delivery of modules to the gin.
Harvest Identification works with the John Deere 7760 Self-Propelled Cotton Picker outfitted with a GreenStar™ 2 2600 or GreenStar™ 3 2630 Display and RFID tags embedded in the round module wrap. The system documents module information that is pertinent to the ginning process, such as client, farm, field, module serial number, harvest date and time, all into one easy-to-read document.
Utilizing the RFID reader on board in the 7760 cotton picker, the system reads the RFID serial numbers embedded in the module wrap and sends the information to the Application Controller 1120. The Application Controller 1120 collects the information and simultaneously displays the module count and serial number, as well as stores the information as a .txt file within the File Server on the display. Once the information is collected it can be easily pulled off the display via data card or USB drive and sent electronically to the cotton gin.
According to Janae Althouse with John Deere Intelligent Solutions Group, Harvest Identification, Cotton, gives growers the ability to continuously harvest cotton without the need for additional labor to manually tag modules. “The program documents 11 of the most important data points during module formation and the embedded RFID tags improve the traceability of cotton modules as they move from the field to gin lot and through the ginning process,” says Althouse. “Growers who have tried the system say it saves time in not having to tag modules in the field and greatly simplifies record keeping and tracking of modules.”
