We found that the seedlings of indica rice cultivar Dular showed chlorosis but the seedlings of japonica rice cultivar Lemont remained green under natural low temperature in early spring. Using an F2 population of Lemont Dular, we found that the difference of cold tolerance at seedling stage between Dular and Lemont is controlled by a single major gene, with the chlorosis allele being recessive. We named the gene cisc(t). With the help of SSR markers, cisc(t) was mapped in a 5.5 cM interval between SSR markers RM257 and RM242 on chromosome 9.