Prof. J. C. Arthur, in Bulletin 28, Indiana Agricultural Experiment Station, exhaustively describes this disease of wheat and other cereals, known otherwise as bunt. It differs from ordinary black smut by its strong odor and inconspicuous-ness. The head becomes normally plump, as if filled with healthy grain, but when crushed it is found that the grain is replaced by a dark brown powder consisting of a mass of spores. " The disease is caused by a fungus growing inside the wheat plant, of which there are two species: Tilletia tritic, with rough spores, and Tilletia fateus, with smooth spores. The latter is most common in the Mississippi Valley." Some other of the author's most important conclusions are:

1. A single spore germinating in contact with the germ of the young wheat plant may enter the same, and by developing along with the wheat produce smut in the seed head.

2. The disease does not spread from plant to plant, or from field to field, but infection takes place during the sprouting of the seed.

3. Smutty seed can be purified by soaking for a short time in a solution of blue vitriol, one pound to the gallon of water, and either sow damp or first dry with plaster or slaked lime.

4. Do not sow wheat for two years upon a field previously affected by smut; follow wheat by some other.

5. Avoid stable manure for wheat land, and do not allow stock to run on land to be put into wheat, since experience shows that animals fed upon smutted grain or straw may excrete with the manure large quantities of uninjured spores.