Agronomic, Yield and Fiber Quality Performance of Released Introduced Hybrid Cotton Varieties in Irrigated Agro Ecologies of Ethiopia

Abstract

In Ethiopia, although research on cotton improvement started as early as the mid 60`s, not much progress have been made to develop high yielding and quality fiber cotton varieties for production. Hence, the purpose of this work was to study the agronomic, yield and fiber quality performance of hybrid cotton varieties (YD-206, YD-203 and YD-211) along two local check varieties (Deltapine 90 and Stam 59A) for local registration and wider use. The experiment was carried out in a non-replicated single plot size of 10m x 10m across seven locations viz. Werer Agricultural Research Center, Amibara, Melkasedi, Gewane, Arbaminch, Shellie and Woyto. The results of this study indicated that, the three introduced hybrid cotton varieties gave higher seed cotton yield than the two local check varieties at all locations. Accordingly, the hybrid cotton varieties showed seed cotton yield advantage of 35.59% (YD-211), 35.54% (YD-206) and 29.43% (YD-223) over the best performed local check variety (Deltapine 90). Similarly lint yield and fiber length performances of the hybrids were superior to that of the local check varieties. Furthermore, agronomic and crop protection practices have to be determined to maximize production and productivity of these hybrids to ensure the profitability of the user and widen its acceptance.