VIEW ARTICLE

Postharvest Pathology and Mycotoxins

Aflatoxin in Cotton After Harvesting. A. C. Griffin, Research Physicist, Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Cotton Ginning Research Laboratory, Stoneville, MS 38776; H. W. Schroeder, Research Leader, Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Transportation and Marketing Research Unit, College Station, TX 77840. Phytopathology 68:119-122. Accepted for publication 31 May 1977. Copyright © 1978 The American Phytopathological Society, 3340 Pilot Knob Road, St. Paul, MN 55121. All rights reserved.. DOI: 10.1094/Phyto-68-119.

Three harvest-storage treatments were applied to seed cotton in the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta area to determine their effects on development of aflatoxins in cottonseed during the period between harvesting and ginning. The experimental treatments were: (i) cotton harvested wet with dew and stored without drying, (ii) cotton harvested wet with dew and gin-dried before storage, and (iii) cotton harvested after evaporation of the dew and stored without further drying. The development of aflatoxins in cottonseed during the interval between harvesting and ginning was minimized by ginning the damp-picked cotton by the end of the third day after harvesting and by ginning the dry-picked cotton by the end of the fourth day. The gin-drying treatment controlled aflatoxin production in the seed of stored seed cotton, but was considered impractical as a cotton-production process.