CROP MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUE FOR INCREASING HYBRID SEED PRODUCTION GENETIC MALE-STERILE COTTON

A study was undertaken to increase the productivity of hybrid cotton s eed and to reduce its production cost. Experiments were therefore cond ucted to reduce the number of pollination days, to determine the feasi bility of off-season seed production in summer (second crop) after har vesting the first rainy season crop, and to examine the possibility of harvesting seed from the second rainy season crop (third crop) all fr om one sowing of parental stack through appropriate crop and fruiting management techniques. Reduction in the pollination period from 60 to 30 days in the first rainy season crop (first crop) did not lead to an y loss in seed yield and also enabled the growing of a summer crop (se cond crop) which gave a similar seed yield to the first crop following a pollination period of only 17 days. The third crop (second rainy se ason crop), exposed to 13 days of pollination, gave the highest seed y ield compared to the first and second crops.