Cane must be of a certain minimum physiological
age before it is large enough to be affected by the
flowering stimulus. This "ripe to flower" condition
occurs at about 2-3 months or after about 3 nodes have
formed on the stalk (Davies & Vlitos4). With older
cane, the flowering stimulus is almost independent of age. However in one experiment where cane was cut
in May, July, September or November 1971, (around
the 15th of each month) it was found that increasing
age between 4 and 8 months resulted in slightly increasing
amount of flowering. This is indicated in
Table XI which gives data meaned for NCo 310 and
NCo 376 over a total of 66 plots.