Case Study: Bowles Farming Company boosts cotton harvest efficiency with DroneDeploy

Adding Drones to a Precision Agriculture Program

Bowles Farming Company, a sixth-generation family farm in California’s Central Valley, needed a better way to monitor cotton drying ahead of harvest and determine when to respray areas that weren’t drying evenly. Working with DroneDeploy and its plant health mapping tools, the farm used drone imagery to gain a more accurate view of crop readiness than traditional manned aircraft snapshots could provide.

DroneDeploy helped Bowles Farming Company map about 3,200 acres of cotton, apply a VARI index, and export the data into John Deere Operations Center to create a variable rate prescription for targeted respraying. The result was a more precise harvest plan, reduced equipment strain, and lower input costs, with defoliant savings of roughly $11–15 per acre for areas that did not need to be sprayed.

Bowles Farming Company

Justin Metz

Technology integration specialist