Talking Gear Tuesday EP22 catches up with Cal from Newells Contracting near Forbes NSW...
of Broadacre Contracting
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Need a cotton stripping contractor?
If you need a cotton stripping contractor around Moree, Narrabri, Walgett, Mungindi or anywhere across northern NSW and the wider cotton belt, give Dillon at Broadacre Contracting a call on 0439 300 380.
We help growers connect with cotton contractors running strippers, pickers and other specialised harvesting gear.
Henderson Cotton Contracting is based out of Moree and operates across surrounding cotton-growing regions, with specialised cotton stripping capability including two John Deere CS770s running custom-built 18-metre stripper bars.
If Henderson Cotton Contracting cannot suit your timing, location or row configuration, Broadacre Contracting can help get the requirement in front of other suitable contractors.
If you have time, create an account and post the job through My Account > New Tender Post > Post the job.
Righto. Now come back, because this Talking Gear Tuesday yarn is a bloody interesting one.
For Talking Gear Tuesday Episode 21, Dillon Harrison and the Broadacre Contracting film crew are out at Moree NSW with Ethan from Henderson Cotton Contracting.
And this episode is not about standard cotton harvesting gear.
These boys are running something a little different.
Actually, very different.
Two John Deere CS770 cotton strippers.
Custom-built 18-metre stripper bars.
Twelve stripping units at 1.5-metre spacing.
Custom extensions.
A redesigned auger setup.
And a couple of years spent working out how to make the whole thing work.
This is what Talking Gear Tuesday is about.
Getting out into the paddock, meeting the people actually running the gear and understanding why they have built their operation the way they have.
On top of the two CS770s, Henderson Cotton Contracting also has a John Deere CS690 cotton stripper and CLAAS headers for its broadacre harvesting work.
But for Episode 21, the real story is cotton stripping.
Why 18 metres?
Why twelve units at 1.5 metres?
How does that relate to row configuration?
And why would a contractor spend years modifying machines instead of simply buying what already exists?
That is what we are diving into.
Henderson Cotton Contracting operates out of Moree in northern New South Wales.
The cotton harvesting side of the business includes three John Deere cotton strippers, while CLAAS headers give the crew additional broadacre harvesting capability.
The machines that immediately grabbed our attention were the two CS770s.
Ethan explained that the crew had fitted extensions, developed a different auger arrangement and spent a couple of years getting the 18-metre system right.
This was not something that simply arrived ready to go from the dealer.
Henderson Cotton Contracting built the system they wanted for the work they were chasing.
Before going any further, we need to make something clear.
Henderson Cotton Contracting is running John Deere CS770 and CS690 cotton strippers.
Not CP770 cotton pickers.
That is important because cotton picking and cotton stripping are two different harvesting systems.
A spindle picker is designed to remove cotton from the open boll while leaving more of the plant behind.
A stripper removes considerably more plant material with the cotton, with the machine then using cleaning systems to help separate unwanted material.
Neither approach should simply be labelled better or worse.
It depends on:
That is why Episode 21 is a cotton stripping episode.
Our Perry Farming episode covers the picker side. Henderson Cotton gives us the opportunity to understand the stripper side.
Well legends, this episode took me into territory I have not spent much time around.
I have never operated a cotton stripper.
I have never operated a cotton picker.
So I am not going to sit here and pretend I am the cotton expert.
But since filming this Talking Gear Tuesday with Ethan, I have spent a fair bit of time researching cotton.
And that is one of the reasons I love filming these episodes.
I get out there.
I ask questions.
Sometimes I ask questions that might seem bloody obvious to somebody who has worked in cotton their whole life.
But they are not obvious to everybody else.
Talking Gear Tuesday is not about Dillon pretending he knows everything.
It is about getting experienced people in front of the camera and learning from them.
Since filming Henderson Cotton Contracting, one of the big rabbit holes I have gone down is row configuration.
I remember asking Ethan whether you could really handle all these different cotton configurations.
At the time, I understood the basic question.
Looking back now after researching it properly, I understand why the question matters much more.
And that takes us to the next part.
After filming Episode 21, I ended up reading through CottonInfo material about raingrown and dryland cotton row-spacing systems.
Some of the common configurations discussed include:
Different configurations can help growers manage things such as available moisture, seasonal risk, plant population and yield potential.
Which then creates another question.
How does the contractor harvest it?
The planting system, wheel tracks, row spacing and harvest machinery all need to make sense together.
If anyone around Moree, Narrabri, Walgett or Mungindi is running one of these systems, I would genuinely love to hear from you.
What lint yields are you seeing?
What works in a dry season?
What works when moisture is there?
What problems do the configurations create at harvest?
What I am learning about cotton is that underneath all the different terminology, it starts coming back to principles that anybody in cropping understands.
Yield.
Quality.
Water.
Efficiency.
Risk.
Same game, different crop.
Once I started thinking about cotton that way, it started making a lot more sense.
Moree is proper cotton country.
It is also one of those regions where agriculture and innovation seem to keep crossing paths.
New machinery.
Australian engineering.
Planting systems.
Agtech.
Growers trying something different.
You name the agricultural problem and there is a fair chance somebody around Moree is having a go at solving it.
Although Henderson Cotton Contracting is based around Moree, cotton work stretches much further.
Narrabri.
Walgett.
Mungindi.
North Star.
Goondiwindi.
St George.
Dirranbandi.
The Darling Downs.
And further again where the job, season and equipment suit.
I actually spoke with Ethan after a grower around the Hay region had questions about what conditions Henderson’s strippers had worked in, what yields they had handled and whether the boys would travel.
That is where contracting gets interesting.
The machine might be sitting at Moree.
The opportunity might be hundreds or thousands of kilometres away.
The right contractor is not always the contractor closest to the paddock.
It has to be the right machine, right configuration, right timing and a job that makes sense for both sides.
We are also seeing cotton production develop in newer regions across northern Australia.
But that does not mean every cotton crop needs a stripper.
It does not mean every cotton crop needs a picker either.
That is why Broadacre wants growers to tell us the actual problem instead of forcing them into a generic category.
Tell us what crop you have.
Tell us how it is planted.
Tell us what you need done.
Then we can help find somewhere to start.
Righto.
This is the part of Episode 21 that really made us stop and look.
Henderson Cotton Contracting is running custom 18-metre stripping platforms on two John Deere CS770s.
The configuration we filmed was:
This is not simply an 18-metre sticker on a brochure.
The Henderson crew had to build it.
Modify it.
Test it.
Work out what did not work.
Then change it again.
Ethan indicated that development took a couple of years.
And that is why I find this episode so bloody interesting.
We are not filming a contractor showing us what he bought.
We are filming a contractor showing us what his team built because the thing they wanted did not exist in the form they needed.
That is Australian agricultural innovation at paddock level.
The simple answer is obvious.
More width means more cotton can be covered in each pass.
But that is probably the least interesting answer.
The bigger conversation is how the stripper integrates with the rest of the farming system.
Moree and northern NSW growers are running serious planting and controlled-traffic systems.
Which means working width and wheel placement can matter just as much as raw machine capacity.
If a grower has designed a system around wider implement widths and controlled traffic, then bringing in a harvest machine that fits that system can create additional efficiencies.
That is when 18 metres becomes more than just “look how bloody wide this thing is”.
It becomes part of the whole system.
Planter.
Wheel tracks.
Sprayer.
Row spacing.
Stripper.
Harvest logistics.
All of it has to work together.
It really falls back into something we talk about constantly across Talking Gear Tuesday.
Efficiencies.
We are forever chasing them.
And once you find one, you start looking for the next one.
There is a deeper conversation with Henderson around why 18 metres was chosen and the efficiencies behind the system.
I am saving some of that for a later Talking Gear Tuesday episode because there is a lot more to unpack.
The third cotton harvesting machine in the Henderson fleet is a John Deere CS690 stripper.
So overall, Henderson Cotton Contracting has three cotton strippers available.
The CS690 is not using the same custom 18-metre setup as the two CS770s.
And I am going to be careful here.
We did not go far enough into the CS690 configuration during Episode 21 for me to confidently tell you exactly what bar and spacing it is running.
So I am not going to make it up.
What I can say is having the CS690 alongside the two custom CS770s gives Henderson additional flexibility when different jobs, rows or timings do not all fit the 18-metre setup.
For growers looking for a cotton stripping contractor around Moree, Narrabri, Walgett, Mungindi or the surrounding cotton regions, that additional machine capability matters.
Henderson Cotton Contracting is not solely a cotton-stripping operation.
The business also runs CLAAS headers for broadacre harvesting.
I mentioned to Ethan during the episode that I do not see CLAAS headers nearly as often as red, green and yellow machines in the contractor circles I move through.
And I will be dead honest.
I have not spent enough time around CLAAS headers to give anyone some big confident review.
I have heard comments around their grain-loss performance.
But hearing it and seeing it are different things.
So CLAAS growers, contractors and dealers — give me something to film.
That is another Talking Gear Tuesday yarn waiting to happen.
Call Dillon on 0439 300 380.
This is probably my favourite part.
There was no simple 18-metre CS770 package sitting there waiting for Henderson Cotton Contracting to order.
The boys developed what they wanted.
Ethan understandably kept plenty of the engineering detail fairly close to his chest.
Fair enough too.
Years went into it.
Custom extensions.
A different auger arrangement.
Fabrication.
Testing.
Problems.
Fixes.
More testing.
That is exactly why we film Talking Gear Tuesday.
A brochure can tell you what a CS770 is.
A spec sheet can tell you horsepower and capacity.
But it cannot tell you why Ethan and the Henderson crew decided the standard setup was not enough for what they wanted to achieve.
It cannot show you the thought process.
It cannot tell you about the failures along the way.
It cannot tell you why a contractor decided to back himself and build something different.
That is the human part.
And that is the bit we want to capture.
If you are a grower, contractor, engineer, fabricator or manufacturer building something genuinely different in Australian agriculture, we want to hear the story.
Give Dillon a call on 0439 300 380.
Broadacre Contracting helps growers connect with agricultural contractors across Australia, including cotton harvesting businesses running both strippers and pickers.
And after filming episodes like this one, one thing becomes pretty obvious.
The detail matters.
If you need a cotton stripper, tell us you need a stripper.
If you are on double skip, tell us.
If the crop is planted at an unusual spacing, tell us.
If you are specifically chasing an 18-metre setup, tell us.
The more useful information you give us, the easier it is for contractors to decide whether their gear and timing fit the job.
Call Dillon on 0439 300 380 from 6am to 9pm.
If it is urgent, ring.
This article comes directly from our Talking Gear Tuesday episode with Ethan from Henderson Cotton Contracting.
The video is the best place to see the machines, hear Ethan explain the setup and understand why this gear caught our attention in the first place.
Reading about an 18-metre cotton stripper is one thing.
Seeing two of them sitting in front of you is another.
Watch Talking Gear Tuesday Episode 21 to meet Ethan from Henderson Cotton Contracting, see the custom CS770 setup and hear the story directly from the people running the gear.
And if the episode has you thinking about a cotton stripping job of your own, call Broadacre or post the requirement through the platform.
Talking Gear Tuesday Episode 21 features Ethan from Henderson Cotton Contracting at Moree NSW. The episode looks at the business’s custom 18m John Deere CS770 cotton strippers, cotton row configurations, their CS690 stripper and the thinking behind building a harvesting setup that was not available as a standard off-the-shelf machine.
A spindle cotton picker removes cotton from open bolls while leaving more plant material behind. A cotton stripper removes more plant material with the seed cotton and relies on cleaning systems to remove unwanted material. Which system suits a crop depends on region, row configuration, yield, crop conditions and the broader harvesting program.
Henderson Cotton Contracting is based around Moree and runs dedicated cotton stripping machinery. Growers can also call Broadacre Contracting on 0439 300 380 or post a tender to put their job in front of suitable cotton contractors across northern NSW and surrounding regions.
Henderson Cotton Contracting has developed custom 18m stripping platforms for two John Deere CS770s. The setup featured in Talking Gear Tuesday EP21 uses twelve stripping units at 1.5m spacing and required custom extensions, auger changes and several years of development.
Row configuration determines how the crop sits across the paddock and needs to be compatible with the harvesting equipment. Growers using solid plant, alternate row, double skip or other configurations should give contractors their exact row spacing and configuration before booking so the contractor can confirm their machine suits the crop.
No. Working width needs to suit the property’s row configuration, paddock layout, controlled-traffic system and harvest logistics. The advantage of Henderson Cotton Contracting is having multiple cotton strippers rather than relying on only one specialised machine configuration.
Give them your location, hectares, row configuration, row spacing, expected yield, likely harvest date, controlled-traffic requirements and any other details that affect machine compatibility or logistics. The more information supplied early, the easier it is for the contractor to determine whether the job suits.
Yes. Alongside its John Deere cotton strippers, Henderson Cotton Contracting also runs CLAAS headers for broadacre harvesting. The business therefore has capabilities outside its specialist cotton stripping operation.
Henderson Cotton Contracting is featured in Talking Gear Tuesday Episode 21. The episode can be watched through Broadacre Contracting’s Talking Gear Tuesday series or directly on the Broadacre Contracting YouTube channel.
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