16 
Journal of Agricultural Research 
Vol. XXX, No. 1 
that black was dominant over white 
and that there were two factors for 
dark color. The presence of one of 
these factors produced gray, while 
when both were present the kernel was 
black. In the absence of both color 
factors white kernels resulted. 
Nilsson-Ehle {92) described cases of 
the spontaneous omission of the color 
factor in oats, giving rise to white and 
gray kernel types in pure-line material 
of black varieties. 
Zade {154) i n his studies of inheri¬ 
tance in Avena fatua observed that the 
kernel colors tended to breed true. 
Thatcher {129) found as the result 
of experiments in crossing oats that 
black hull was dominant over white 
hull. 
Nilsson-Ehle {95) showed that there 
is a very definite linkage of the factor 
which inhibits awning and the factor 
for yellow color. 
Etheridge {33) states that the color 
of the lemma when ripe has been ac¬ 
corded various degrees of importance 
in classification by other investigators. 
In some cases Etheridge used color as 
the basis for separation of the principal 
groups. He states that it is the most 
conspicuous character of the oat grain, 
that it is certainly inherited, and there¬ 
fore is of particular use in identification 
and description. He points out that 
while the color is affected by changes in 
environment and may pass into differ¬ 
ent tones of the same general hue, it 
does not transgress the limits of the 
type. One must not attempt to make 
fine subdivisions of color, for the dis¬ 
tinctions may be lost by variation 
within the type. In his review of the 
work of previous investigators Ether¬ 
idge states that Nilsson {89) Denaiffe 
and Sirodot {26 ), and Dufour and Das- 
sonville {27) all used color in making 
varietal distinctions. He also states 
that Bohmer {9) used color as a final 
means of distinguishing varieties, while 
Fruwirth {38) believed color of little 
importance, and Atterberg {5) men¬ 
tions it only as a descriptive character. 
Surface {127) presents the results 
obtained from a cross of Avena fatua 
with Avena sativa, variety Kherson. 
He states that the wild parent has a 
dark brown or almost black lemma 
color, while the Kherson has a yellow 
color. He found Fi to be intermediate 
in color between the two parents and 
of a lighter brown color than the wild 
parent. In F 2 and F 3 it was shown 
that the results could be explained on 
the basis of the presence of three sep¬ 
arate factors, black, gray, and yellow, 
each of which is allelomorphic to white. 
Gaines {40) has studied the inher¬ 
itance of lemma color in oats in 10 
different crosses. The parental com¬ 
binations used by Gaines in studying 
this character were as follows: ( 1 ) 
Storm King X Black Tartarian, ( 2 ) 
Regenerated Swedish Select X Black 
Tartarian, (3) Black (Cereal Investiga¬ 
tions No. 290) X Regenerated Swedish 
Select, (4) Black X Sixty-Day, ( 5 ) 
Black X Palouse Wonder, ( 6 ) Black 
X Hull-less, (7) Sixty-Day X Chinese 
Hull-less, ( 8 ) Black Tartarian X Hull¬ 
less, (9) Canadian X Chinese Hull¬ 
less, and ( 10 ) Storm King X Chinese 
Hull-less. 
In a total of 29,730 F 2 plants a ratio 
of 24.9 per cent of plants with white 
florets to 75.1 per cent with black 
florets was obtained. Gaines believes 
that the factor for lack of hulls in oats 
which causes the floral glumes to ex¬ 
pand, elongate, and remain widely 
spread at maturity (the characters that 
distinguish naked varieties), inhibits 
the development of the dark color in 
the floral glumes, for in all the crosses 
not a single true naked plant devel¬ 
oped black floral glumes. If it had not 
been for the brownish coloring of the 
palea the naked hybrids which bred 
like black oats when crossed with white¬ 
hulled varieties could not have been 
distinguished from those that were 
genetically white. 
Love and Fraser {69) observed in 
crosses of Burt with Sixty-Day and 
with other varieties that the yellow 
color of Burt apparently carries no in¬ 
hibitor for awns, but that the yellow 
color of Sixty-Day apparently carries 
this inhibitor in a manner similar to 
Kherson, as described by Surface {127), 
Wilds 19 studied crosses of the wild 
oat, Avena fatua, with Tartar King 
and Sixty-Day, and concluded that the 
genes for color of the flowering glumes 
segregate independently of each other, 
each being allelomorphic to white or 
to its own absence. In the cross of 
the wild oat X Tartar King (white) 
the F 2 ratio obtained was very close 
to the expected 12 blacks and browns : 
3 grays : 1 white. In the cross of 
the wild oat X Sixty-Day (yellow) 
an F 2 ratio of 12 blacks : 3 grays : 
1 yellow was observed. 
The ratios obtained in these crosses 
indicated a negative correlation be¬ 
tween yellow lemma color and fatua 
articulation, between yellow color and 
awns, between yellow color and basal 
lemma pubescence, and between yel¬ 
low color and dorsal pubescence. 
Caporn {14) studied the inheritance 
of kernel color in crosses between 
18 Wilds, G. J. op. cit. 
