Productive performance of ultra-narrow groove cotton in acid soils in Colombia

Resumen

Menegua is the first variety of cotton specifically for acid soils in Colombia with recommendation, in addition to including in the corn-soybean rotation system, as a strategy to expand the cotton frontier in the sub-region ‘altillanura plana’. However, its agronomic management in relation to planting distance requires adjustment as a strategy to improve the competitiveness of cotton in terms of yield, quality and costs. The objective of this study was to determine the effect of the ultra-narrow groove compared to the conventional one in the productive performance and quality of cotton under conditions of an oxisol acid soil in the Colombian altillanura plana. An experiment was carried out in Puerto Gaitan-Meta, during the 2015B agricultural cycle, a randomized complete block design was used with two treatments corresponding to distances between rows in cm): T1 = 0.4 and T2 = 0.8 and four repetitions; the Menegua variety with specific adaptation for acid soils was used and production and fiber quality variables were determined. The change of the conventional distance from 80 cm to 40 cm caused an increase of 13.1% in the height of the plant, a 29.2% reduction in the number of specks plant^-1 and a decrease of 23.1% and 23.9% in the yield of seed cotton and yield of fiber cotton, respectively, the percentage of fiber extraction and its quality was not affected. It is concluded that in the subregion ‘altillanura plana’ on an oxisol acid soil the ultra-narrow groove compared to the conventional affect the Menegua variety in a negative way the productive behavior without detriment of the quality of the fiber in cotton.