CHAPTER XXVI 



DISEASES OF SUGAR-CANE 



The sugar-cane is by origin a coarse and vigorous grass, which 

 retains in the forms developed by cultivation the general habit 

 of grasses, and is therefore particularly suited to field conditions. 

 The principal diseases to which it is subject are not such as are 

 encouraged by heavy rainfall, and in good soil it is well able, 

 especially while the shoots are young, to withstand exposure to 

 sun and drying winds. It produces a crop which is dependent 

 only on vegetative growth, and not as in the cereal grasses on the 

 successful ripening of grain. For these reasons it is adaptable 

 to a very wide range of conditions of soil and rainfall. 



Succeeding on an original diversity of crops, the cultivation 

 of sugar-cane was for a period general throughout the settled 

 parts of the British West Indies ; it grew in light and heavy soils, 

 under copious and scanty rainfall, in humid and in exposed and 

 wind-swept situations. 



The disastrous depression of the cane-sugar industry in the 

 second half of the nineteenth century led to replacement of sugar 

 cane by other crops wherever this was seen to be possible, and 

 the nature of the alternatives available meant for the most part 

 that the well-watered and more humid situations were planted 

 in cacao and limes. This applies to Dominica, much of St. 

 Lucia, Grenada, Tobago, and a considerable part of Trinidad. 

 On the other hand, St. Kitts, Antigua, Barbados and certain 

 areas of Trinidad, unsuited to orchard crops, maintained a much 

 impoverished sugar industry ; while the remaining islands be- 

 came almost dereUct until the revival of cotton cultivation. 



Though the central factory system increased stabilitj^ and the 

 Great War brought temporary prosperity, this remains, with a 

 few survivals in other localities the distribution of the sugar 

 industry in these islands. An account of the conditions prevail- 

 ing in each island is given in another section. In general the 

 present position, as the outcome of the history outlined above, 

 is that sugar-cane cultivation is mainly restricted to the drier 

 islands or in the case of Trinidad the drier or more exposed 

 districts, a result of considerable ecological importance. 



The outstanding factors favouring the growth of sugar-cane' 

 are rainfall, atmospheric humidity, soil aeration, and nitrogen 

 supply The combination of optimum conditions in these respects 

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