People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 December 1895 — TREATMENT OF CORN SMUT. [ARTICLE]

TREATMENT OF CORN SMUT.

Purdue University Agricultural Experiment Station, Newspaper Bulletin No. 16, November 22, 1895. The smut in corn differs in several important particulars from the common smuts of the smaller cereals, wheat, oats, rye and barley. In no respect is the difference more marked than in its mode of attacking the plant, and in this fact lie valuable hints to the cultivator. It has been assumed that because the smut of wheat and oai,s can be prevented by immersing the seed in hot water or a solution of some fungicide, the same method is applicable to corn. But it is not true, and for the reason that the method by which the corn smut attacks the plant is very unlike that of most of the oilier cereal smuts.

It has been found out at the Indiana Experiment Station that the smut does not attack the plant through the seed, but like wheat rust it starts in the leaves and stems, wherever the spores are carried by the wind and find lodgment and sufficient moisture to enable them to germinate. The spores will grow as soon as ripe, that is as soon as the mass containing them turns black, and they will also retain their vitality for a year or two in case conditions for growth are not favorable. It is evident from this that neither the time of planting nor the previous condition or treatment of the seed will have any effect upon the amount of smut in the crop; experiments already carried out substantiate this deduction. It is equally evident that meteorological conditions will have decided influence. But the farmer cannot control the weather.

Two things can be done to decrease smut in corn. The growing crop can be sprayed with a suitable fungicide and the entrance of the smut into the plant prevented. That this can be made effective is shown by experiments at the Indianastation. But it is an expensive and troublesome method. The other, more convenient but less thorough, method, is to gather and destroy the smut, and thus eventually rid the fields of it.

The best time to gather the smut is just before the ears silk, when the fields should be gone through and every signs of smut removed, being careful not to scatter it upon the ground or in any way let the spores get free. The gatherings must be burned or deeply buried to certainly destroy the smut. One or more later gathering should also be made. This may be called clean culture, and if persisted in for a few years would reduce the annual production of smut to an inconspicuous and harmless amount. J. C. Arthur. Botanist.