Rice false smut is a severe and widespread disease in major rice-growing areas of Asia, Africa and America [1-4]. It has been in the Unite States since at least 1906 [5]. Since that time, the disease has been sporadic and light in the US for many years. In 1997, however, high incidence of rice false smut was reported in Arkansas and Louisiana. The false smut was present on many germ plasms at the Rice Research Station and was observed on commercial cultivars in growers’ fields. The disease incidence ranged from 1% to 15% of tillers infected, with at least two to three spore balls per infected panicle [6]. In China, rice false smut has long been considered a minor disease in rice production, and farmers even called smut balls the harvest fruits, meaning the harbinger of a
big harvest for rice yield. Recently, with the wide use of high-yielding varieties and heavy application of nitrogen fertilizer in rice cultivation, rice false smut has emerged as the most devastating grain disease in rice production [1,7].