Soil moisture and row spacing effects on cotton fiber properties

A two-year cotton experiment to determine the effects of varying row spacings and soil moisture levels on the physical properties of fibers was conducted at the West Tennessee Experiment Station at Jackson. On both years Stoneville 213 cotton was planted in a Memphis silt loam soil.

Row spacings of 10, 20, and 40 inches were employed with average plant densities of 150,000, 83,000, and 41,000 plants per acre, respectively. Separate samples were picked by hand from the top and bottom portions of the plants. Fiber physical properties were evaluated by standard 50-gram spinning and other fiber tests.

Decreasing the distance between rows caused a reduction in the size of the plants as well as the size and number of bolls on the plants. Due to the greater plant density in the narrower row plots, however, the total lint yield per acre was not significantly altered by varying row spacing.

Cotton fibers tended to become shorter, weaker, and finer (less mature) as rows narrowed. The fibers which grew in the upper portions of the plants were slightly shorter although more uniform in length, stronger, and coarser than those which grew below them.

Since the differences in soil moisture level achieved between the Irrigated and nonirrigated plots were small, soil moisture level had little effect on most of the parameters studied.