CORN INSECTS 



215 



196. Ear rots of corn. These have been found to be 

 due to minute organisms, most of them belonging to two 

 groups of fungi 

 (Diplodia and 

 Fusarium), and in 

 rarer cases to un- 

 identified bacteria. 



In some of the ear 

 rots, the shuck, as 

 well as the grain and 

 cob, is discolored, 

 while in others only 

 the grains and cobs 

 are reduced to a 

 shriveled mass cov- 

 ered with white, 

 pink, or reddish 

 mold-like threads. 



The Illinois Ex- 

 periment Station 

 (Bui. 133) has found 

 these fungous rots 

 to be spread by 

 spores left on the 

 shanks of the corn 

 crop of the two pre- 

 ceding years. Hence, 

 the remedy is plant- 

 ing of corn on a field 

 on or near which no corn, injured by these diseases, has been 

 grown for the last two years. Doubtless the burning of the dis- 

 eased stalks promptly after harvest would tend to prevent the 

 spread of ear rots to subsequent crops. 



FIG. 108. CORN SMUT. 



