158 A MANUAL OF FARM GRASSES 



water is available, either from the rainfall or from irri- 

 gation. It is propagated by planting pieces of the stem. 

 In the tropics the sugar cane flowers but produces only a 

 small quantity of seed. It is from the seed that new 

 varieties are originated. The flower head of the sugar 

 cane is a huge feathery plume. The botanical name is 

 Saccharum officinarum L. Most of the sugar cane in the 

 continental United States is grown in Louisiana. Sugar- 

 production is a very important industry in the depen- 

 dencies of the United States, the Hawaiian Islands, Porto 

 Rico, and the Philippines. 



In 1900 Europe produced about 4,000,000 tons of beet 

 sugar which was one-third more than the total world 

 production of sugar from the cane. The production of 

 sugar in Louisiana in 1900 was 132,000 tons as compared 

 with 650,000 tons in Java and 440,000 tons in Cuba, two 

 important sugar producing countries. 



Sugar is produced also from saccharine varieties of 

 sorghum or sorgo (see page 126), but nearly all the 

 product is used for syrup. The syrup industry is 

 mainly confined in the United States to the region 

 from North Carolina to Kansas. 



