Mineral Nutrition of the Cotton Plant.

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Abstract
The cotton plant has evolved a remarkable ability, through its mechanism for shedding superfluous young bolls, for maintaining mineral and carbohydrate composition of leaves + stems throughout the long period of boll setting and fiber development. Late season fibers tend to have the same lengths, weight-per-inch, and strength as the early ones. With little change in the percentage composition of leaves and stems, a heavy uptake of N, P, Ca, and Mg was continuous throughout the boll period (and of K during the first half); the minerals currently accumulated were moved onto the bolls. At maturity the weight of buds and bolls constituted 66% of the weight of the entire plant. The buds and bolls contained 57% of the total N, 79% of the P, 46% of the then remaining K, 53% of the Mg, but only 34% of the Ca. Between seed kernels and 5-day-old seedlings (emergence on day 4) as grown in the greenhouse, large accumulations of N, K, Ca, and Mg occurred, but there was a loss of P. Between 10 and 30. days the dry weight and weight per plant of several of the minerals tended to double at 5-day intervals.