The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1888-09-29
SHUTS AFFECTING WHEAT.
Remedies That Have Proven Successful
In Various Sections.


Large losses recur annually to the
wheat crop through the injurious agency
of smuts, The disease variously termed
hard smut, bunt. smut bolls, etc, causes
not only large percentage Of loss in
grain, but reduces the value OF what Is
grown by imparting to the crop fetid
odor, which has given rise to the name
shrinking smut In some localities While
wheat is growing it is difficult to distin.
gush hard smut, as IL is in the young
kernel of the wheat, which Is hidden by
the chaff, that the characteristic black
have been destroyed by hard smut they
present an unusual external appearance;
they are shorter and more swollen than
are healthy seeds and are of dull green
ISL drab color and are frequently cracked
Smut, or, rs it is generally called, loose
smut" to distinguish it from bunt or
hard smut is not only injurious to wheat,
but to barley, and especially to oats.
As with bunt,so with loose smut the dis.
ease begins at the bottom and works up.
ward. This smut is not restricted like
bunt, to the seeds alone, but the whole
ear is destroyed.
The above facts. presented by Professor
Fletcher in bulletin issued from the ex
perimental farm at Ottawa, Canada, have
little practical bearing, unless one can
draw from them something which may
suggest where to look for remedy. This
they do, explains the authority quoted
from. Everything points to the infection
coming from the ground and travelling
upward.
Remedies which have been most sue
cessful are those in which methods have
been adopted to destroy the spores adher.
ing to the seed wheat previous to sowing
by washing or sleeping the grain in some
weak poisonous solution.
A common remedy and one advised by
Professor Fletcher, Director Scovell, of
the Kentucky Experiment station, and
others is n solution of silphate of copper,
also called bluestone or blue vtriol Some
advise merely wetting the seed. Others
say to soak the grain. An English author
ity advises: One pound of bluestOne dis
solved in five quarts of boiling water Is
sufficient for sack of four imperial bush
els The wheat is soaked for ten minutes,
or the ten pints of solution may be poured
over till all is absorbed" A Manitoba
farmer says the following has proven sue
cessful in his district: Zone pound of sui
plate of copper is dissolved in pailful Of
hot water, which Is then sprinkled by one
person over ten bushels of wheat placed
in a wagon box, while some one else keeps
the grain well stirred. Should large
amount of smut be detected in grain re-
quired for seed the solution is made
stronger, double the quantity of bluestone
being used" The chief advantage claimed
for this method is that in a few hours the
grain is sufficiently dry to SOW with the
drill.
Mr. Plumb, while at the New York Ex-
perimental station, used four ounces of
sulphate of copper in one gallon of water,
and reports that seeds soaked seventeen
and half hours in this solution were
fonnd to produce a slight amount of
smut. Soaked forty hours all germs of
the fungus were killed" 1t ought to be
told that his experiments were with oats,
In which, from the fact that the seed is
contained inside a comparatively loose
husk, there is much more difficulty in re-
moving or destroying all the smut pores
than is the case with the smooth and
naked grain of wheat.
At ,ue kentucky station the method Of
applying the solution of blue vitriol was
as follows: Ten pounds of blue vitriol
were dissolved in eight gallons of water
and the solution placed in a tub. The
seed wheat was put into the solution and
well stirred, care being taken not to put
enough wheat in to come to the top of the
After Swimming off floating
wheat and particles the solution was
poured off into a second tub, the wheat
drained and spread on boards to dry. The
solution was reused as often as we had
wheat to treat in this manner. This treat
ment proved entirely successful