Comparisons of yield, yield components and fiber technological characteristics of modern cotton varieties

This study was carried out to determine yield, yield components, and fiber quality characteristics of some modern cotton varieties and also to find out their improvement compared to control varieties in terms of investigated traits in the 2015 and 2017 cotton growing season. In the study, 10 genotypes (8 modern cotton varieties which registered after 2010 and two check varieties) were used as plant materials. There were significant differences between varieties in terms of first picking percentage, ginning percentage, plant height, date of first flowering, number of the node to first fruiting branch, number of monopodial branches, boll weight, seed cotton weight, number of seeds per boll, fiber fineness, length, strength, elongation, and uniformity, while non-significant differences were obtained for seed cotton yield, number of sympodial branches, number of boll per plant and short fiber index. Besides, year differences were significant for seed cotton yield, first picking percentage, plant height, date of first flowering, number of the node to first fruiting branches and fiber fineness. A year and variety interactions were also significant for the date of first flowering, fiber length, strength, elongation, and uniformity. In conclusion, there was an improvement in used modern cotton varieties for ginning percentage, plant height, first picking percentage, date of first flowering, number of the node to first fruiting branch, number of monopodial branches, boll weight, seed cotton weight of per boll, number of seeds per boll, fiber fineness, length, strength, and elongation, while they showed similar values in terms of seed cotton yield, number of bolls per plant, number of sympodial branches, fiber uniformity ratio, and short fiber index.