• 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.

Sugarcane red rot

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.