Severely clean to remove badly infected seed. Use fungicidal seed treatment to prevent seedling blight. Use tillage to bury crop refuse and use crop rotations. Avoid planting small grains on corn land. Scabby grain may contain a mycotoxin and can cause vomiting and feed refusal in nonruminant livestock.
Infection occurs during seedling development but no symptoms show until heading.
Heads on infected plants may be partly or entirely affected. Smut balls replace seeds. Smut balls are enclosed with gray membranes that break at harvest releasing black spores. Survival and Spread. Survives as bunt balls and spores.