Five days ago, rain showered this cotton crop, soaking the soil and making the delicate round cotton bolls droop and dangle from the plant.

From 10 AM to 10 PM, harvesters are driven across the circular (pivot irrigated) fields. The harvesters use specialized harvester heads that twist and pull the soft, cotton boll from the plant; and then the cotton bolls are vacuumed up into a large open-air bin. When full, operators return to the mobile industrial area to unload cotton into 'stompers' (module builders). Stompers use a hydraulic ram and tramper beam to compress the cotton into modules, 32 feet long, 7 1/2 feet wide, and 9 1/2 feet tall. Once complete, the stomper is raised and pulled away, simultaneously pulling a protective tarp over the top. Once covered tight, the modules become the property of the cotton gin. At the end of each day, a vacuum is used to pick up all the fallen cotton and added to a module.

The Schirmer family have owned and operated farms in the south-central Texas region for six generations, since 1875. In the harvesters are Ernie Schirmer Farms (Batesville) Operations Manager Brandon Schirmer (in blue shirt and blue brimmed cap, 6th generation), and farm owner and father Ernie Schirmer (dark shirt and orange cap, 5th generation), Jerry Berstraeten, with son Brett; at the same time, Ernie's wife Terri (green T-shirt and tan cap), cousin Cali Erfurth (white t-shirt, and white cap), Derek Reininger (grey t-shirt and tan cap) and a fellow farm owner Carl Santleben (brown shirt and lime and grey baseball cap) operate the stompers. Watching the operation are Howard (light blue shirt and tan baseball cap) and Barbara Schirmer (white flowered-blouse,(4th generation).

Farmers are sometimes known to invite people to ride with them in the harvester to give them an up-close view of the source of their food and clothing. Today, Pricilla Salinas, daughter of USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) Resource Team Leader Samantha Salinas, is invited to ride in the cotton harvester operated by Ernie Schirmer.

For more information about the Schirmer family and their farms, please go to flic.kr/s/aHsmPYgNPx