45 

 Burning over of heavily infected fields or of She land 

 on which ergot has been allov/ed to mature will destroy a large number 

 of the sclerotia. 



Destruction of all susceptible grasses in the vicinity 

 of the cereal fields, or mowing them when in blossom, is a very useful 

 practice in the elimination of ergot. In some cases, this has to be 

 done several times during the season in order to entirely prevent the 

 formation of sclerotia. 



Clean seed 

 Only sclerotia-free seed should be used. Separation of 

 the sclerotia from the grain by various means is uead very widely. 

 Screening, sifting, fanning, and sedimentation of the seed are used for 

 this purpose. Weinziere (292) found that by the use of special nachines 

 for cleaning and grading of grain the amount of ergot can be decreased 

 to 0.17 per cent. In rye with 1 per cent of ergot the amount of ergot 

 can be decreased without difficulty to 0.06 percent and even less, accord- 

 ing to Hotter (107) While, in this way, we may decrease the number of 

 scelerotia in the seed it is not possible to separate them entirely. 



The separation of sclerotia by sedimentation is the most 

 effective method for obtaining sclerotia free seed. Miiller (185) first 

 used this method and he was the first to apply to it the term sedi- 

 mentation. He used a solution of 30 to 32 percent of common salt or 37 

 percent of potassium chloride for the sejaration of ergot. The grain 

 having a higher specific gravity than the ergot remains on the surface 

 and can be easily tateen out. The grain is then washed with water and 

 rapidly dried. He reconmends the use of potassium chloride instead of 

 common salt because it does not injure the seed and, besides this, it can 

 be used as fertilizer after the treatment. 



