Host diversity in the very late maturity cotton cultivar Ashor 1 was created by gamma rays in order to select agronomical desirable earliness genetic variants. Seeds of cotton cultivar Ashor 1 were exposed to 250 Gy of gamma rays and planted with untreated seeds. Selection for earliness was conducted in M2 progeny. Evaluation trails on the selected variants resulted in choosing ten promising variants. Earliness percentages of the selected variants ranged from 84.30 to 88.8 compared to 60.8% Ashor 1 cultivar. However, the productivity of these variants ranged from 85.0 to 133.30 g cotton flower/plant while it was 49.20 g in Ashor 1 in the first picking (160 days after seed sowing). The selected variants also surpassed their origin in total yield of both first and second picking (one month later). Fiber length was not affected in eight variants while remarkable reduction was observed in two variants.
M. A.AL-Hamdany and H.Y. Jaber. (2009) INDUCED PROMOSING EARLINESS VARIANTS FROM LATE MATURE COTTON CULTIVAR ASHOR 1 BY GAMMA RAYS IN IRAQ , , Volume 6, Issue 3.
