short-staple cotton vs cotton

short-staple cotton and cotton both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
short-staple cotton	Yes	No	No	No
cotton	Yes	No	Yes	No

As nouns, cotton is a hypernym of short-staple cotton; that is, cotton is a word with a broader meaning than short-staple cotton:

Other hypernyms of short-staple cotton include cotton fiber, cotton wool.

short-staple cotton (noun)	cotton (noun)
cotton with relatively short fibers	fabric woven from cotton fibers
	thread made of cotton fibers
	erect bushy mallow plant or small tree bearing bolls containing seeds with many long hairy fibers
	soft silky fibers from cotton plants in their raw state

short-staple cotton (verb)	cotton (verb)
	take a liking to