| III. Editorial Remarks Communication I have read with great interest your articles in Wheat Information Service on the Exploration Results of the BMUK 1959. The article in the last issue (No. 12) by yon and Dr. Tanaka was of particular interest because it discusses points of collection of many species of Aegilops in Eastern Mediterranean countries. I have been studying the reaction of species of Aegilops to Physiologic races of leaf rust. Toward the end of your article you discuss Aegilops cylindrica from Turkey and mention two varieties-a-long-awned and an awnless or few-awned form. As you probably know, Ae. cylindrica has become a weed in Kansas since 1918. It apparently was introduced from Russia as a mixture in the hard red winter wheat variety Turkey. There are two varieties of it, one of which has scabrous glumes, while the other has pubescent glumes. They may grow intermixed or separately. In places the grass is so abundant that roadsides are almost a solid stand of it for long distances. It invades the edges and corners of wheat fields and may become a troublesome weed. Both varieties cross readily with common wheat although F1 Plants nearly always are sterile, The heads of F1 plants disarticulate at the base, falling away entire instead of spikelet by spikelet as in the two varieties. I would classify both varieties as awned, although both have long apical awns and shorter awns on lower spikelets. Both varieties tiller very abundantly, are very winter hardy, and make excellent grazing for livestock. I assume that the varieties that came from Russia are no different from those you found in Turkey. August. 3, 1961 C. O. Johnston Professor of Botany Kansas State University Manhattan, Kansas, U.S.A. Correction In the article of J. G. Th. Hermsen- "The symbolization of complementary necrosis genes in wheat: a proposal" -in WIS No. 12, the last 7 lines in page 23 should be crossed out, so that the article ends with the sentence-"Finally the symbol Ne can cause no confusion with other symbols, as far as the author is aware." |
| --> Next |