Waukena white… a new cotton breeding line resistant to Verticillium wilt

AN EXPERIMENTAL BREEDING LINE for a cotton resistant to Verticillium wilt, given the name “Waukena White,” is described in this progress report. Limited tests in a wilt nursery maintained on the Don Davis ranch at Waukena, Tulare County, where the breeding line was selected, indicate that it has the capacity to yield 1.5 to 2.5, 500-lb bales of cotton per acre on heavily infested wilt land. The fiber quality is excellent, and the seed has a high oil content.

Verticillium wilt resistance previously has been available in such cotton varieties as Tanguis and Seabrook, but they are late maturing and low yielding under San Joaquin Valley conditions. Therefore, a new cotton with tested resistance, ideal plant type, and highly acceptable fiber, has potential value to the cotton breeding effort in California. Botanically this cotton has been identified as Gossypium barbadense L. It has yellow flowers with red petal spots, and thus— as identified in section 347(a) of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938—it is classed as extra-long staple cotton.

Lack of Federal allotments for extra-long staple cotton in the San Joaquin Valley of California prevents cultivation there of Gossypium barbadense and hybrid cottons derived from the species. However, the wide publicity it has received makes it advisable that it be described. This description is given in the hope that some day it may be useful in the development of improved varieties for the cotton areas of California now economically depressed because of wilt.