During the past few years there have been numerous studies made of various characters in wheat. Some characters which were thought at first to be simple in inheritance have since been found to be rather complex. The data in the following pages are the results of an investigation made to study the inheritance of awns in a cross between Hard Federation and Kota varieties of wheat. Until the last few years awn inheritance in wheat has been regarded as extremely simple, that is, as being dependent on a single factor difference. The awns of the F1 plants have nearly always been intermediate in length between the awns of the two parents with the F2 ratios 3:1 or 1:2:1, awnlessness usually being regarded as dominant. Recently, however, it has become apparent that the inheritance of awns is much more complex than the original data indicated. Several workers have found two independent factors and one has found two factors segregating in such a fashion as strongly to suggest linkage between these two factors.

Wheat is the most important cereal crop of the world, and one of the most serious diseases affecting it over much of its range is covered smut or bunt (57). The word "bunt", according to Heald (48), is a contraction of an old English term, "burnt ear", which fittingly describes the ravages of covered smut.

Wheat is the most important cereal crop in the world. It is the principal staple food in Russia, United States, China, Canada, India and a number of other countries. Covered smut is one of the most serious disease of wheat all over the world. According to Woolman and Humphrey (82) it was known from very early times and is referred to by Theoprastus and other early Greek Roman writers.