BUD VARIATIONS IN SUGAR CANE 



Carl S. Pomeroy 



Bureau of Plant Industry, United States Department of Agrieultiire, 



Riverside, Cal. 



THE occurrence of bud mutations 

 in cultivated plants has long been 

 known and the commercial value 

 of many -/gUch forms has been 

 recognized. Seveiral hundred bud vari- 

 eties of fruits, flowers, and other plants 

 grown for their economic or ornamental 

 value are in more or less general culti- 

 vation at the present time. As examples 

 of such varieties mentioned may be made 

 of the Washington Navel orange, the 

 Pima cotton and several forms of the 

 Nephrolepis fern. 



A recent study of plant varieties 

 known to have originated as bud muta- 

 tions disclosed the importance of such, 

 forms in the development of the cane 

 sugar industry. The following account 

 of the bud origin of several sugar-cane 

 varieties is presented in the hope that it 

 may reach a wider distribution among 

 students of genetics than was secured 

 by the publications reviewed, i. e.: fl) 

 The West Indian Bulletin, vol. 2, No. 

 3 (1901 or 1902), pp. 216-223. "Bud 

 Variation in the Sugar Cane." (2) 

 "Cane Sugar," Noel Deerr, London, 

 1911, pp. 23-38. 



Anyone especially interested in this 

 subject should consult these articles, as 

 Mr. Deerr's book has colored plates of 

 several of the bud-varieties described 

 and the figures reproduced herewith are 

 shown in color in the West Indian 

 Bulletin. 



Susrar cane (Saccharuni officinaruni 

 Linn.) is one of the most important of 

 our economic crops, and yet the devel- 

 opment of the scientific study of it 

 dates back but little over a generation. 

 This is probably due largely to the con- 



finement of its cultivation to widely 

 scattered districts, most of which are 

 remote from the older centers of civili- 

 zation and to the decentralized develop- 

 ment of the industry. 



Previous to 1885 it was generally be- 

 lieved that the flowers of the sugar cane 

 were infertile, notwithstanding that 

 there are several earlier recorded in- 

 stances of the occurrence of seed. All 

 propagation was by the planting of 

 joints of the stalks, and it is believed 

 that practically all the varieties in com- 

 mercial cultivation up to within the last 

 twenty-five years originated as bud 

 variations. 



.Since the rediscovery of the fertility 

 of the flowers of the sugar cane, which 

 M^as made independently by Soltwedel 

 in Java in 1888, and by Harrison and 

 Bovell in Barbados in 1889, valuable 

 varieties have been developed as seed- 

 lings. Commercial propagations are 

 still made entirely by planting pieces of 

 the stalk. Seed propagation is only 

 practiced in the search for new varieties, 

 as seedlings show the characters of their 

 parents in but very slight degrees. 



VARIATIONS FROM STRIPED VARIETIES 



The earliest recorded instance of bud 

 variation in the sugar cane is given by 

 Mr. J. F. Horne,^ then Director of 

 Forests and Botanical Gardens in Mau- 

 ritius. In describing canes imported 

 into Mauritius he wrote : "Two plants 

 were found, one of which, while pro- 

 ducing striped canes from one eye, pro- 

 duced green canes from another eye. 

 both of which eyes belonged to the samr^ 

 piece of cane, while the second plant 



^ The magazine Sugar Cane. No. 17. 



129 



