Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1916-01-14
SMUT SPORES IN SOIL
CAN Be CONTROLLED
State Experiment Station Is Making
Progress i'm Study of Important
and Difficult Problem

Wheat men of the Northwest, who
in past years have pocketed losses OF
millions from the smut-plague, will
find in the most recent studies OF
this subject by the State College of
| Washington, reasons for discourage
ment, and reasons for optimism
happily, with the latter predominant.
Some new light on the smut germ is
offered-where and how it lives, how
and when it attacks, how it nour-
ishes and reproduces itself, and, most
welcome news, how, when and where
it dies
Perhaps the most discouraging
thing about the smut-germ is the
vastness of its host, and the facility
with which it is transported from
field to field. Distance means moth
ing to the smut germ when the wind
is blowing. The pathologist of the
experiment station and his assistants
proved this. Taking up the work in
DR.. Head suspected that wind dis
semination" was of Importance. 1t
was found that in the first week in
September, 1915, thousands of smut
spores fell on a square inch of soil in
field quite a distance from any
wheat field. Twenty-Five leaves
taken from orchard trees quite dis
tant from wheat-fields, harbored on
their surfaces between three and four
million smut spores. On top of Mount
Kamiac, nearly thousand feet above
the level of surrounding wheat fields
smut, spores were discovered on the
wild vegetation.
Judging by what was found, it is
| likely that on almost every square
inch of soil in the smut-infected
wheat-belt, there fell during the
threshing season $4,000 or more
smut spores.
A smut ball of average size con-
tains sufficient smut spores, accord
ing to estimates, to place one on
every kernel of wheat in five or six
bushels; enough, if scattered over an
acre, to place rs spores on each
SQUARE foot of ground.
Other factors of the smut problem
were discouraging. a smut ball, or
head, buried in the ground, retains
viable smut spores for u year or
more, depending upon the moisture,
temperature, and compactness of the
soil. Worse still, and fact entirely
new to smut inyestigators-an appar-
emily normal grain of wheat may con-
tain in it's white, starchy interior a
few smut germs barely visible, or,
possibly invisible to the naked eye;
but there and ready for business just
the same.
The latter thing will be a shock to
wheat-growers. The germs buried
inside the wheat kernel can not, of
course, be reached by vitriol or for
maldehyde without killing the life
germ of the wheat.
Dismaying as the foregoing aspest
of the smut problem may be, there
are many reasons for hope. The
smut germ, like living things in gem
eral, has its weaknesses, it's points
of yulnerabilfty. 1t will die in uncon-
genial conditions just as it thrives
where conditions suit it. In spite of
the vastness of its host, it is COM
paratively frail. For example, all
the separated spores strewn far and
wide and in countless millions last
harvest, will be dead next spring;
rather, they will be dead unless dur
ing the past fall or the present win
ter, they connect up with a wheat
plant. They can not live alone.
In moist, loose soil which is
neither too warm nor too cold, the
smut spore terminates, throwing out
what we shall call "feelers''-avoid-
ing huge botanical word-in quest
of wheat plant. If the feelers ftLd
succulent wheat sprout, the micro
scopic smut plant is at once incor-
porated into the wheat plant, feed
ing upon the latter and developing
! therein.
But--rejoice, you growers of
wheat-if the feelers fail to probe
into sprout, then, in d little while,
the smut spore dies. unmourned and
without descendants.
So the wheat-grower sees his
chancellor, really, he has one. He
must handle his soil in such a way,
and plant his wheat at such time
and under such conditions as to en-
allie the young wheat plants tc avoid