1 Juny, 1901.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 85 
.. Mr. Henry Tryon, Entomologist to the Department of Agriculture, then 
read his paper on— 
SOME OBSTACLES TO SUCCESSFUL SUGAR-CANE CULTIVATION. 
In presuming, as a delegate from the Department of Agriculture, to speak to you 
on this occasion, the writer has been influenced by two considerations. First, the fact 
that the Conference has elected to sit in one of the most important of the sugar- 
producing districts of Queensland, and that therefore—as it appears—there is a distinct 
obligation on the part of those present to address themselves to some of the problems 
that confront those engaged in cane cultivation, or at any rate to endeavour to 
recognise, by the amount of attention that they bestow on the subject, the very 
high position that it holds in the State amongst those industries that are denominated 
agricultural. Then, again, the original programme, drafted by the convener of the 
meeting, made provision for discussing some of the obstacles to successful sugar-cane 
culture, arising both from the inroads of disease and the attacks of injurious insects ; 
and an impression was engendered that it was in the nature of things that one, who 
was known to have given earnest attention to this particular phase of the industry, 
might be called upon on this occasion to venture some remarks in reference thereto. 
For reasons, however, that are apparent it has been decided on the present 
occasion to limit the treatment of the subject to a consideration of one or two Hseaees 
only. These have formed the subject of complaint, on the part of cane-planters 
resident in the districts that embrace the agricultural coastal lands lying to the north 
of Broadsound, but which have probably a much wider range of occurrence than 
such complaints indicate. 
As sights tins amongst many of the forms in which these are couched, and of 
the serious incidents that have given grounds for their expressions, the following 
quotations from communications ryeeived may be given :— 
* The loss this year, 19 0, from a disease which is seriously affecting the sugar- 
cane here has been great, and it is evident that, unless measures are found to remedy 
the evil and prevent its spreading, it may in a very short time prove a serious draw- 
back to the sugar industry throughout the colony’’—26th October. And, again, “The 
stool I am sending is in the early stage of the disease, and was dug up to-day, and to 
all outward appearances the canes were quite healthy, but the disease has started in 
four or five of them. There are plenty of stools in the district with all the canes in 
an advanced stage of the disease *—12th November 
Again, as recently as the 30th March, we find the Herbert River (Ingham) 
correspondent of the Queenslander writing as follows :—* The rot which appeared 
some months ago is now very bad.” There are grounds for concluding that this 
disease, which is variously referred to as cane rot, Burdekin rot, or by other similar 
designations, was—as far as its outward symptoms are concerned—deseribed in a 
pamphlet issued by the Agricultural Department in June, 1895, entitled “Gumming 
of Cane” (op. cit. pp. 57-8). It is not to be inferred, however, that the mention of it in 
a memoir dealing with the “Cane Gumming” implies the existence of any similarity, 
much less identity, between the two cane affections. 
A second sugar-cane disease that may prove to be identical with the one which will 
be the first to be dealt with in the following pages, and which is probably generally 
prevalent, is thus alluded to bya former manager of one of the central sugar-mills :— 
* The disease is a very pronounced one, and has lost me close on 120 tons of sugar 
this season, in actual cane left on the fields, apart from the loss occasioned by ernshing 
over 4,000 tons of diseased cane’’—23rd Noy., 1900. 
And there are grounds also for concluding that, in other instances, even greater 
destruction has been occasioned by a malady identical to that to which this extract has 
reference. 
With regard to these very serious losses experienced by sugar planters in the 
several districts mentioned, and which must represent a monetary equivalent of many 
thousands of pounds sterling, it must be admitted that until special investigations 
have been most carefully prosecuted the primary cause or causes that have occasioned 
so immense a destruction of sugar-cane cannot be definitely assigned. 
It may, however, in the meanwhile be permissible, but with no intention of 
anticipating the important discovery of their causation, to recite the following facts 
which in the minds of some cannot but he regarded as being of much significance :— 
Funeus No. 1—Melanconium sacchari.* 
Tn the year 1899 the writer remarked the common occurrence on decayed sugar- 
cane of a peculiar fungus that was submitted to F. M. Bailey, Colonial Botanist, who 
i eet peice id ree meereenng mre ry etapa 
* The fungus associated with the Sugar-cane Rind Disease of the West Indies, 
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