The Owosso times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1897-1926, 1903-09-04
Agricultural College Bulletin.

| The unusual prevalence of sinking
smut in the wheat crop of 1903 calls for
extraordinary effort on the part of
Michigan wheat growers to prevent a
repetition of the loss next season. 1t
is now we'll known that this smut is a
disease carried forward from one year
to another in the seed wheat. The dis
ease converts the kernel into black,
ill-smelling mass of spores which,
when the smutty kernels are kroken
up by the threshing machine or by
handling, attach themselves to the
sound kernels. After infected wheat
is sown, the kernels and these spores
of smut terminate at the same time
The smut plant grows inside the
wheat stem throughout the season, and
when the crop is ripening, it turns
the kernel in the head of the wheat in
to the we'll known smut kernels. The
spread of the disease may best be pre-
vented by finding, if possible, seed
wheat free from smut. If you cannot
obtain clean seed for your chosen va
riety, try the following treatment:
The first step is to clean off space on
the barn floor some ten feet square or
larger if convenient. Sweep this area
very thoroughly to remove all spores of
smut possible.
Next buy of your druggist pound
bottle of formalin. He may not have
this agent in stock, therefore, order it
at once that he may have it in time for
your use in September.
Mix the formalin with water in a
large barrel in the proportion of one
pound of formalin to four hundred
pounds of water. This means that the
pound of formalin should be mixed with
fifty gallons of water, enough for
thirty-five bushels of wheat. Knowing
the proportions you can mix any guam
tity desired Be sure to keep the bottle
of formalin tightly and securely corked.
1t is not a dangerous poison but is I'M
healthy to take either by the nose or
mouth. Do not mix the formalin and
water until you are ready to use them.
Thoroughly wet the floor, on which
you are to treat the wheat, with this
formalin mixture, make it good and
wet. Then spread on layer of the
seed wheat which you have previously
well cleaned with a tanning mill. With
a sprinkling pot go over the layer of
wheat, wetting it thoroughly, shoveling
it over and resprinkling until every
kernel is wet on all sides. Add more
wheat and sprinkle or take up the
wheat already treated and put down a
new lot Before putting the treated
wheat into bags to carry to the field it
may lay in pile for day, not longer
because of the danger of heating and the
farther danger that an excess of the
formalin may hinder termination. Put
the treated wheat into clean bags or in
to bags that have been wet with this
formalin mixture. Be careful not to
stir up dust in the barn while the
treated wheat is still exposed. The
dust will be likely to be made up largely
of the smut spores which we are fight
ing.
If you want to drill the wheat, it is
well to allow it to dry either on barn
floor treated long enough beforehand
with the formalin mixture to allow it to
become thoroughly dry or on canvas,
free from smut spores, and spread on
the ground in the sun. The drill and
everything else with which the wheat
comes in contact after treatment should
be free from smut spores or washed with
the formalin mixture.
If you cannot buy formalin at your
you may try corrosive subli-
mate if you dare when you remember
that it is a deadly poison, and the
greatest care must be taken to allow no |
animal access either to the drug itself
or to the wheat that has been treated. |
Use pound of corrosive sublimate to
400 pounds of water fifty gallons).
Dissolve the drug in three or four gal |
Ions of hot water in wooden vessel. |
Do not allow the mixture to come in
contact with metal. Later add enough |
cold water to bring the amount up to
the fifty gallons. Proceed as with the |
formalin mixture, except that great
care must be exercised to prevent pois-
oning live stock or children.
Our experiments have shown that |
either treatment will reduce the amount |
Of smut in the wheat to very small |
quantity or, if the season be right, will |
prevent smut altogether.
G. D. SMITH,
Director.