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Sugarcane and Industrial Crops Not sure it is this disease? Use the Disease Finder in anee.io ›

Sugarcane smut

A long black whip covered in a thin silvery skin grows out of the top of the stalk and sheds black powder.

Sporisorium scitamineum Fungus Fact sheet
Sugarcane smut: the black, whip like shoot that grows from an infected cane
Photo: William M. Brown Jr., Bugwood, CC BY 3.0 us, via Wikimedia Commons

Crops it strikes

Tubo Sugarcane

What you see

Stunted plantsPowdery or fuzzy growth

When to act

Walk the field every two weeks from about two months after planting and count stools with whips. Bag and burn every whip before it sheds. The usual rule is not to ratoon a field where more than about 1 stool in 10 carries whips, but to plow it out.

Before you spray

No spray cures it. Plant resistant varieties and clean, hot water treated setts, and bag and burn the whips before they shed spores.

How to prevent it

  • Plant resistant varieties: they are the main defense.
  • Take setts only from a clean nursery, treated in hot water at about 50 to 52 degrees.
  • Pull out smutted stools, after slipping a bag over each whip so the spores stay in, and burn them.
  • Plow out badly infected fields instead of keeping the ratoon, and rest the land or rotate before replanting cane.
  • Do not bring setts from areas with smut.

Not sure it is this one?

Many diseases look alike. Send a photo to Anee, the smart farm technician in anee.io. She reads it with your crop, its age and the weather, and tells you what it most likely is and what to do first. In Tagalog or English.

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