A Study of Cotton Color Drift from Cotton Bales Stored for Making the USDA Upland Grade Standards

Color drift was studied for over 300 bales of cotton covering the full range of Upland cotton color grades. These bales are all U.S. grown Upland cottons from various parts of the country and cover approximately 10 crop years. Bales were acquired soon after ginning and have been stored without interruption in the non-air conditioned USDA Cotton Standards warehouse in Memphis, TN. Rd and +b color measurements were made at initial bale acquisition and repeated once per year for as long as the bales were held. Strong relationships were observed between amount of color drift and color grade.