Pacific Pests, Pathogens, Weeds & Pesticides - Online edition

Pacific Pests, Pathogens, Weeds & Pesticides

Sugarcane red rot (221)


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Summary

  • Worldwide distribution. Common throughout Oceania. On sugarcane, maize and sorghum, crop relatives and wild species. Important fungal disease.
  • Infections through nodes and wounds. Large red external patches, and internal rots with white spots at right angles to stem. Leaves yellow, dry and die.
  • Spread in setts, and by water-splashed spores or in irrigation water.
  • Cultural control: setts only from healthy fields; avoid planting in dry or wet times; treat setts in hot water (50°C for 2 hours); avoid soils that waterlog; avoid overlapping crops; tolerant varieties; collect trash and burn after harvest.
  • Chemical control: none recommended; not an economic option.

Common Name

Sugarcane red rot

Scientific Name

Glomerella tucumanensis; different strains are reported that vary in their ability to cause disease. The fungus is also known by its asexual stage, Colletotrichum falcatum. In Brasil, Colletotrichum siamense and Colletotrichum plurivorum are also the cause of red rot disease. 


AUTHOR Grahame Jackson
Information (and Photos 1&2) CABI (2014) Glomerella tucumanensis (red rot of sugarcane) Crop Protection Compendium. (https://www.cabi.org/cpc/datasheet/25361); and from Marins EFC, et al. (2022) Colletotrichum species associated with sugarcane red rot disease. Fungal Biology 126(4): 290-299. (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35314060/). Photo 3 Kohler F, et al. (1997) Diseases of cultivated crops in Pacific Island countries. South Pacific Commission. Pirie Printers Pty Limited, Canberra, Australia.

Produced with support from the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research under project PC/2010/090: Strengthening integrated crop management research in the Pacific Islands in support of sustainable intensification of high-value crop production, implemented by the University of Queensland and the Secretariat of the Pacific Community.

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