PERFORMANCE OF BT COTTON VARIETIES UNDER KHANEWAL CONDITIONS

M. Hassan, M. A. S. Raza, M. Luqman, N. Shahid, G. M. Shah

Abstract: Since 2002, farmers in Pakistan have been growing cotton that contains the frst generation of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt). although, formally unapproved and unregulated, a large number of Bt cotton varieties have been cultivated now a days in Khanewal. in order to identify the superior genotype for this area, we studied the comparative growth and yield performance of ten cotton cultivars namely, MNH-886, BH-178, FH-142, VH-301, IUB-222, CIM-602, MNH-456, Tarzen-1, BH-180, FH-114 on clay loam soil. all the treatments were arranged in a randomized complete block design with three replicates. At 160 days after sowing, numbers of bolls plant-1, seed cotton weight boll-1(g) and seed cotton yield (kg ha-1) were recorded for each treatment by selecting five random plants per plot. The results revealed that all these parameters differed significantly (P < 0.05) among Bt cultivars. FH-142 had the highest value for the no. of bolls plant-1, weight boll-1 and seed cotton yield. A positive co-relation was found between no. of bolls plant-1 and seed cotton yield, whereas no such relation could be established between seed cotton weight boll-1 and overall seed cotton yield. it was concluded that FH-142 performed best in all of the studied traits
than other cultivars and may be recommended for cultivation in Khanewal agro-ecological conditions.

Keywords: cotton; ecological conditions; genotype; Khanewal; seed cotton yield

Date published: 2017-09-08