Storage of Stripped Seed Cotton in Round Modules

Cotton pickers with on-board module builders (OMBs) are increasing in popularity, largely due to the labor saving associated with their use.  The appeal of these OMB picker harvesters led John Deere to introduce an OMB stripper harvester.  Simultaneous to OMB harvester development, gin closures combined with increased US production to have led to longer module storage periods between harvesting and ginning.  Stripper harvested seed cotton contains substantially more plant material than picker harvested cotton, and this plant material is usually higher in moisture than the lint and seed.  The objective of the proposed research is to characterize changes in lint and seed quality of OMB-stripper-packaged seed cotton with time, foreign matter content, and seed cotton moisture content.  Observations from 2013 and 2014 show that moisture moves in and out of round modules much slower than similarly-stored conventional modules making seed cotton moisture content at harvest more critical.