India’s second most valuable agricultural crop and the basis of the sugar, ethanol, and by-product industries — grown across 5 million hectares from UP’s Tarai to the peninsula’s river valleys.
Sugarcane : 5 Major Threats and Their Control
For educational purposes only. Recommended crop varieties are location-specific. Always verify chemical and variety recommendations with your local KVK or State Agriculture Department.
1. Red Rot
(Colletotrichum falcatum)
The Threat:
- Red rot is the most destructive disease of sugarcane in India, responsible for the near-collapse of cane cultivation in parts of UP in the 1990s before disease-free sett programmes were introduced.
- The pathogen enters through infected setts or damaged internodes, especially after waterlogging or insect injury.
- Infected stalks show distinctive red discolouration and a typical sour alcoholic fermentation smell.
- In ratoon crops, a single season of red rot can spread across the root zone and destroy up to 50% of the crop.
The Solution:
- Use certified, disease-free setts from registered seed nurseries — the foundation of red rot management.
- Give heat treatment to the setts before planting.
- Treat setts in hot water (50 – 52 °C for 2 hours) or with aerated steam (53 °C for 4 hours) before planting to kill the internally carried fungus without harming sett viability.
- Grow recommended resistant varieties.
- Rogue and burn infected stools immediately after detection; never ratoon a red rot-affected field.
2. Top Shoot Borer
(Scirpophaga nivella)
The Threat:
- The top shoot borer attacks sugarcane in two distinct phases:
- First-generation larvae: attack the young shoot from emergence to the first tiller stage, causing “dead heart” — the central leaf whorl turns yellow and dies while outer leaves stay green.
- Second-generation larvae (August–September): attack the growing apical bud of established cane, again causing dead heart in plants that have already grown for 3–4 months.
- Borer activity significantly reduces the number of productive stalks at harvest.
The Solution:
- Apply Carbofuran 3G granules (Systemic Insecticide — Carbamate) @ 5 kg/ha in the leaf whorl at first dead heart appearance; the granules release the active ingredient over 4–6 weeks, covering the larval stage.
- Install pheromone traps (Semiochemical) @ 5 per hectare to monitor adult moth emergence and time the application at peak egg-laying, improving the efficiency of the chemical intervention.
3. Pyrilla / Sugarcane Leafhopper
(Pyrilla perpusilla)
The Threat:
- Pyrilla is a gregarious, sap-sucking leafhopper that forms large populations on the underside of leaves.
- Feeding produces copious honeydew, which falls on lower leaves and promotes rapid growth of sooty mould colonies.
- The black fungal layer blocks photosynthesis, and along with sap loss, reduces sucrose content and cane weight.
- In severe cases, the entire lower canopy of the sugarcane field gets covered with honeydew and black mould.
The Solution:
- Avoid excessive urea application, as it promotes succulent growth that attracts Pyrilla.
- Dip setts in Chlorpyriphos (Organophosphate insecticide) 20 EC solution (2 ml/litre) before planting.
- Apply Carbofuran 3G granules (Systemic Insecticide — Carbamate) @ 5 kg/ha in the leaf whorl at first dead heart appearance; the granules release the active ingredient over 4–6 weeks, covering the larval stage.
- Install pheromone traps (Semiochemical) @ 5 per hectare to monitor adult moth emergence and time application at peak egg-laying for better effectiveness.
4. Smut Disease
(Sporisorium scitamineum)
The Threat:
- Sugarcane smut turns the growing apical bud of an infected cane into a long, curved black whip of fungal spores at the grand growth stage.
- The infected cane produces no harvestable material, only sterile, spore-bearing structures.
- Spores spread by wind and rain, infecting healthy setts and buds of nearby plants.
- Infected setts are the main source of disease entry into new fields.
The Solution:
- Treat setts by soaking in Carbendazim 50 WP solution (Systemic Fungicide — Benzimidazole) @ 1 g/litre for 10 minutes before planting to remove externally carried spore inoculum.
- Grow recommended smut-resistant varieties.
- Remove and burn black-whip plants immediately after detection, as the whip tip releases millions of spores even at the slightest disturbance.
5. Waterlogging / Flooding
The Threat:
- Prolonged waterlogging during the formative tillering stage (first 0–4 months) creates root anaerobia, severely limiting tiller production.
- Root anaerobic conditions happen when roots don’t get enough oxygen, usually due to waterlogging or poor drainage. The roots then switch to anaerobic respiration (fermentation) to survive, which leads to root rot, buildup of toxic compounds like sulfur (with a bad smell), and can eventually kill the plant if it continues.
- Reduced tiller production directly lowers final stalk population, which determines cane yield.
- Every tiller lost to early waterlogging is a permanent reduction in final cane count.
The Solution:
- Adopt trench or furrow planting — sow setts in trenches or furrows to raise the developing ratoon and tillering zone above waterlogged soil.
- Maintain open drainage channels on all four sides of the field throughout the growing season.
- In fields with perennial waterlogging, install sub-surface drainage (tile drains) at 60–90 cm depth.
Additional Reads
Ph.D. in Agricultural Engineering.