Ear diameter,ear length,axis diameter and ear weight of maize（Zea mays L.） inbred lines ‘Mo17’,‘Huangzao 4’and the F₉ Recombinant Inbred Line（RIL） population derived from the cross between ‘Mo17’and‘Huangzao 4’were investigated.According to the data of the RIL population,descriptive statis tics,correlation analysis and frequency distribution graphs of the four ear characters were performed with SPSS11.5 software.The results provided the phenotypic data for quantitative trait locus （QTL） mapping of the four ear characters.